Hazael Ayars grew up in Shiloh New Jersey, Seventh Day Baptist community, where his family had lived for 200 years. As a young man he set out to make his future in the Empire State of New York. He first settled in Unadilla Forks, where he became acquainted with a family by the name of Stranbow. Hazael married one of the Stranbow daughters, Cornelia in 1842. The couple eventually moved to Springville and later Clarence, New York, 14 miles east of Buffalo. In a house across from the Seventh Day Baptist Church they started their family. Hazael was not a minister, though officials of the church wanted to ordain him, but he was called an exhorter, something like a deacon or elder. His roles involved visiting church members who were sick. In 1843 Hazael and Cornelia were influenced by traveling Millerites who believed the second coming of Christ would take place in 1844. Although this prophecy was not then fulfilled, Hazael was strongly converted to what became the Seventh Day Adventist Church. Hazael was eager to share his newly invigorated faith with anyone willing to listen so he moved his family back to New Jersey. The family moved to Shiloh in 1852 to share the Adventist message with everyone. At this time Hazael worked as a woodworker and a shoemaker. With little relative enthusiasm for the new Adventist message, Hazael and Cornelia decided to move back to Clarence, New York. Eight years later in 1864, near the end of the Civil War, the family moved to Pewamo, Michigan where a sizeable Adventist settlement existed. His death certificate states he died of congestion of lungs. Age 55. Hazael and Cornelia had six children altogether: Lucy, Edith, Benjamin, Alice, George Manning, and Arnold. Hazael died in 1867 and was laid to rest in East Plains Cemetery north of Pewamo.