Thousands of people in the south of Brazil—and thousands more throughout North and South America—are responding to an evangelistic call sounded by Seventh-day Adventist evangelist Mark A. Finley during a series of Bible presentations held here in November.

The meetings were shown via satellite in 400 churches in Southern Brazil, on television across the nation, as well as via satellite downlinks throughout the hemisphere. More than 120 billboards advertised the meetings in Curitiba, as well as 160,000 newspaper supplements and radio and television ads. Thousands of people who were new to the Adventist Church attended at 64 sites in and around Curitiba alone, an experience church leaders say was duplicated in many locations.

“The Holy Spirit is working in peoples’ lives,” Finley said during a Nov. 8 sermon. “I see it when I enter the door of the church. I see it in their eyes and when they tell me how God is transforming their lives.”

According to Pastor Ari Celso Cidral, an Adventist evangelist in the Parana region, total responses for Brazil are not in.  However it is expected that the high number of responses in the south of the nation—it is believed that at least 1,000 were baptized at the end of the series in Curitiba—will be reflected elsewhere. E-mails have come from as far away as the United States in response to the broadcasts.

“I never saw somebody with so much Bible knowledge,” said Pastor Irenio Koch, director of Radio Novo Tempo, an Adventist station in Curitiba, which featured an interview with Finley.  Finley is speaker/director emeritus of the popular “It Is Written” telecast and now oversees global evangelism efforts for the Adventist world church.

The lecture series presented basic concepts including prophecy and the end of the world, the Bible Sabbath and laws of health and good living.