Inside Story

Cows Lead Boy to the Sabbath

Rompas was born into a Maasai family in Kenya. His father had nine wives. So, Rompas had a big family: nine mothers and 82 brothers and sisters! Rompas was child number 62.

When Rompas was 13, he was taking care of his father’s cows. All of a sudden, the cows started to move in the same direction. Rompas followed the cows to an outdoor religious meeting. The man who preached was a Bible worker from the United States.

Rompas was interested in the sermon. Rompas never went to school, so he didn’t know how to read the Bible. But he liked to listen to sermons on the radio on Sundays. He enjoyed remembering what he heard on the radio and preaching the sermons to his family. His family named him “Pastor” because he loved preaching so much!

But the Bible worker was preaching a message that Rompas never heard before. The Bible worker said the Bible teaches that Saturday, not Sunday, is God’s holy day.

Rompas ran off to find a friend who knew how to read and write. Rompas asked the boy to copy the Bible verses from the sermon. The boy wrote down 33 verses about the seventh-day Sabbath.

That evening, Rompas took the cows home. But he didn’t stay. He walked four miles (six kilometers) to the home of a pastor. Rompas handed the pastor the list of 33 verses. Rompas asked, “Are these verses in our Bible?”

The pastor looked up the verses in his Bible and said, “You went to a meeting of people who worship the devil.”

Fear filled Rompas’s heart. He said, “Oh Lord, save me!”

The pastor hit the boy many times on the cheeks with his Bible. The pastor said, “In the name of Jesus, I cast out the devil who took control of this boy.”

Rompas got home late. After he fell asleep, he dreamed. In his dream, he saw the Bible worker preaching about the Sabbath again. Rompas woke up, afraid. He worried he was filled with the devil. So, he asked God to remove the devil from his heart.

For the next three years, Rompas had the same dream every night. In his dream, he saw the Bible worker preach about the Sabbath. For three years, Rompas lived in fear that the devil controlled him. For three years, Rompas asked God to remove the devil from his heart.

Then he thought, “What if this dream is a message from God? ‘Help me, Lord, to know if what the man preached is true.’ ”

With that prayer, the boy named “Pastor” started to become a real pastor of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Today, Rompas knows Bible truth. He teaches it to other people in Kenya.

Provided by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission, which uses Sabbath School mission offerings to spread the gospel worldwide. Read new stories daily at https://AdventistMission.org .