Faith, patience and putting in the time without expecting any reward has landed Uitenhage singer and songwriter Loyiso Bala a plum job.
Bala took up his role as channel director of TBN Africa earlier this week.
The 39-year-old musician has been moving from strength to strength, balancing music production and song writing with television production and presenting.
Bala began his journey with Christian channel TBN in 2012 when he approached the channel’s chief operating officer, Leon Schoeman, asking if he could help with the launch of TBN Africa.
“My journey started when TBN parted ways with [Faith Broadcasting Network].
“Leon Schoeman was the channel director for Europe, Africa as well as the UK and I volunteered myself to serve and help out with the launch. When TBN launched, I was the music director and there was no monetary value for me,” Bala said.
From there he went on to presenting and producing several shows on the network, including the show TBN meets which was one of the channel’s flagship shows.
“I was already a volunteer doing a gospel show, so for me it was going to be an easy fit to move from there to TBN.
“I did that for three years, but I also used to come into the office and sit through meetings and help with some of the strategies that they had.
“Around that time I had started studying a post grad in management at Henley Business School and when I did that successfully I started my MBA. So this was a good ground for me to apply what I was learning to a business.”
Fast forward four years and all his hard work and devotion paid off.
Bala was offered Schoeman’s TBN Africa channel director position.
“I got a call from Leon. He told me he would no longer be working with TBN as a channel director.”
From there Schoeman, who will continue as the COO, offered Bala the job.
“It would be very easy for someone to think that I applied for the job, but I’ve been faithful in serving the station without wanting anything.
“There were many times where the team would say ‘we wish we could have you do something here so we could reward you for what you do’ – but I told them that my reward will come from God; it could be here, it could be elsewhere, but I’m just being obedient to my calling,” Bala said.
He added that he had grown both spiritually and as a person over the past seven years and that God had been at the centre of everything.
Bala officially reported for duty on Tuesday.
His duties include leading an experienced team in content creation, brand and channel identity, marketing and new business strategies.
Talking about his faith, Bala said his journey to establishing his purpose had started in 2010 when he went to bible school.
He highlighted that it was important to establish one’s purpose in life, adding that success did not equate to purpose.
“It was around 2010, I was in Scotland at the time and I had a deal pending in the States.
“After a few days in bed I felt in my heart that there had to be more to it and I felt I had not yet quite tapped into my potential,” he said.
Bala said he came back to South Africa and went to bible school to see if he could find what he lacked.
“My life spiritually stared to change. When I made the switch from singing RnB and pop it was daunting because I wasn’t sure how people would receive it.
“But surprisingly, what started to happen is that the same fans that I already had began to send me messages telling me how pleased they were that I was doing gospel.
“And then I came to realise that in our country, there are a lot of closet Christians,” Bala said.
Speaking about his music career, he said music was his form of expression and he had been doing it from primary school. He would continue to produce and write songs.
“I have a single that I’m working on currently titled Yahweh (God) which will be released in the next two months. I’m going to have to be stricter on my time management.
“Music was given to me as a vehicle to spread good news; it intertwines with everything I do, and the [TBN team] fully support that calling.
“But for the next six months or so I’m going to spend most of my time here (TBN Africa head office) to make sure I get things in motion.
“I’m very grateful that this is the plan that God has had for me all along and I’m going to execute it to the best of my capability.
“And if there’s anything else that he has planned for me, I’ll execute that to the best of my abilities as well,” he said.
Lucky Mbiko, managing director for TBN in Africa, said: “We are excited about bringing Loyiso on board as we believe he will form an integral part in the next phase of our development strategy.
“We have a big vision for both content production and distribution in Africa as we are looking at providing our viewers with good quality, original content.”