By Nile Hosni –
When he felt called to reach Amazonians, Esequiel Santo took a six-day bus trip from Rio de Janeiro, a six-day boat trip, a 15-day canoe trip to reach the remote communities where he would evangelize.
“Sometimes it would take 35 days just to get to the remote areas,” he says. He was 15 when he started.
Thanks to Esequiel and other missionaries, the 30M Amazonians are experiencing an unprecedented revival that is turning a predominantly Catholic nation into an Evangelical Christian nation.
In the first six months of 2024, the Foursquare Church baptized 14,500 new converts and had the goal of dunking a total of 30,000, said Josue Bengsten, a missionary for decades traversing the region by river travel.
“Back when we started evangelizing in this region, we had just a few workers,” Bengsten said. “In some municipalities, some pastor had to walk 10 to 15 kilometers to open a congregation. Today every medium-sized church has a boat.”
The Foursquare Church as 3,200 churches across the Amazon region.
From when he started at age 15, Santo spent 32 years evangelizing in the jungle of Solimoes River and the Purus River. “We saw lives being transformed,” Santo said. “So many people heard the Gospel, and now we are seeing the fruits.”
By contrast, the Catholic Church uses mostly priests to do its work. A priest needs about eight years of study to become ordained. The Evangelical Church raises up leaders in house, studying just the Bible and eschewing things like Latin and Church Philosophy.
As a result, Catholic priests show up to realize mass in local parishes once every three or six months. They run a circuit. They are short on personnel, says Jose Alves, a Brazilian sociologist.
“It’s very common to see Catholic churches in the Amazon but not enough priests to lead the congregations,” Alves said. “Evangelicals quickly train pastors who integrate into the community.”
Brazilian senator Damares Regina Alves says the revival in the Amazons is remarkable.
“The revival we have been waiting for here in Brazil is happening in the Amazons.”
Trends don’t mean much to Amazon resident Ramos. He’s 83. All he cares about is his easy-going riverside life and Jesus, whom he got to know thanks to the spread of churches in the region.
“God is everything for me,” Ramos said. “God is my father, and without Jesus I am nothing.”
