His family moved to Frederick County, Virginia, where at the age of seventeen he was first awakened to his need for the Saviour. William Marshall Taylor described the preaching on that occasion : My eyes and ears were caught by the preaching as the minister was treating on the awful scene of Judgment. He stood upon a great white oak stump and preached spiritual life into my soul. Two of his companions in sin, Isaac and Joseph Redding were soon converted and began to preach the gospel. Their preaching further stirred Taylor until he believed on the Lord and was Baptized into the membership of the South River Baptist church by Elder James Ireland. He was licensed the preach the gospel and set apart to the great work of his life. Lewis Craig, John Pickett, John Cunes, Joseph Redding and Theodrick Noel composed the Presbytery. James B Taylor in his Lives of Virginia Baptist Ministers summarized the Early labours of Taylor. After some exercise of his talents in addressing his fellow men. He was deemed by this brethren, qualified to labour in word and doctrine and was accordingly licensed. About this time Joseph Redding began his ministerial career. These two servants of Christ with apostolic zeal and courage, carried the sound of salvation into regions it had never reached. They were two of the most caring spirits of that age. Very frequently their journeys were extended beyond the Blue Ridge more than two hundred miles. This was then a thinly settled country. In these western excursions they were received with open arms. They were not like their Eastern Brethren subject to the opposing rage of the established church, but they were not without trials. Most of their journeys were performed on foot over a rugged and almost unbroken wilderness and they were continually in danger of falling prey to the savage barbarities of the Indians as they passed on from Fort to Fort. The good hand of the Lord alone preserved them in Hunger and thirst, in watchfulness and weariness, did Mr. Taylor go forth to preach the gospel. The ministry of this itinerant was greatly blessed, several churches were founded, mainly under his influence. John Taylor and wife, Elizabeth traveled by Riverboat to Kentucky in 1783. They were charter members of Clear Creek Baptist church. He remained here until 1795 when he left for Boone County, Kentucky. Later when this church was in a declining condition, Taylor was again called to the pastorate. At 70 years of age, he began to preach and a revival commenced and continued more than a year. J. H. Spencer in a history of Kentucky Baptists wrote: Mr. Taylor was uneducated in the popular meaning of the term, but was a man of a remarkably strong clear intellect and of calm sound judgement. As a writer he was crude, but always strong and eminently practical. Everything He ever wrote said the Distinguished William Vaughan is worth reading. he was very familiar with the Bible and as a preacher he was plain, practical and abundantly successful. He was like Boone, a pioneer by nature. His history of ten churches published in 1827 is by far the most valuable contribution that has yet been made, to the history of the early Baptists of Kentucky.