Stephen Hayes
Born: April 13th 1941
"Training for life" missionary to Africa
by Rit Nosotro First Published:: 2003( )
Stephen Hayes was born in Durban, South Africa on 13th April 1941. His parents, Frank and Ella Hayes, were atheists but because of a peculiar reason he was baptized in St. Thomas's Anglican Church in Durban.
When he was eleven years old, he went to St. Stithian's College, which is now known as Randburg, and he finished six years later in 1958. In this church school, there were several Christian teachers. Steyn Krige and Derrick Hudson, who were two Christian teachers, had an immense influence on Stephen and so he decided to follow a Christian life and to give a huge bend to his life from the moment he decided to serve the Lord.
The most worthy experience for Stephen was attending a course in the Orthodox theology, which was at the World Council Churches, in Bossey, Switzerland. He returned to South Africa in July 1968, having completed the diploma in Theology al Durham. Time later, David de Beer, who was Stephen's companion, invited him to attend to the Orthodox Church. David's leader, who was the leader of this church, told Stephen that he did not had enough money to pay for him. As a result, Stephen found a job with the department of Water Affairs with the purpose of paying for himself. A month later, he was released because he was working at a Christian institute and this was a problem for the company. Although he was released he got a new job as a proofreader with the "Windlhoek Advertiser", which was the local English newspaper.
Ronald Gestwicki, who was an American priest, was unpleasant to provide theological training for two independent churches, the Oruuano Church and the church of Africa. Since he finished his job, Stephen Hayes tried to continue were he left off so he became interested in the idea of the Theological Education by Extension (TEE), for training people for ministry in the independent churches.
In February 1972, since Stephen was deported from Namibia, he went to Natal and he found some other people interested in TEE. He worked happily in TEE the next six months travelling around South Africa at his own expense after he chose all this people wisely trying tremendously to make the idea of TEE come true.
Stephen's daughter was born while he was at Madadeni but after a year they were asked to move to Melmoth. Stephen's wife, daughter, and him were living at Melmoth for five years, which seemed as an eternity for them. While he was teaching other people he was also taking courses extremely intense at the university of South Africa, in missionaries conferences and Church History.
"I thank God because he has giving me wonderful children, today, I have all I need, my wife is one of my biggest support and He has giving me strength through all my life" Wrote Stephen in a diary he has been writing since he was just a kid, at the age of eleven.
Stephen is still alive and he lives with his children and his wife. Now he is an editor, writer, teacher, and especially a missionary that has been helping people throughout a poor continent, Africa. He is extremely famous in the Christian missions to convert African people, who have not received a sufficient amount of education.
