The following are the views expressed by Olufemi Oguntokun in the September 2, 2026 episode of the On the Lord’s Side Podcast — Christian perspectives on news and current events.
ON “A REAL MAN WON’T LEAVE HIS WIFE” — AND THE MINIMISING OF ADULTERY
Good morning to you once again. It is Wednesday, the 2nd of September 2026.
Have you noticed that more and more people in Nigeria are saying a real man will not leave his wife, even if he catches her with another man? Have you seen the clips on social media — different men coming out to say, “I would not leave my wife, even if I caught her with another man”? How should Christians engage with this trend? Let me describe a clip that was posted on X. The person who posted it captioned it: “See how all the women there are excited and celebrating him, because he said he would not divorce his wife if caught sleeping with another man. They are excited because they really wish their husbands were like that, so they can do what they want to do. And to that man, reality hasn’t hit him yet — he’s still speaking grammar. Hopefully, if it happens for real, let’s see what he would really do.”
In the clip, the man says: “I can’t divorce my wife simply because I caught her with another man. Anyone who knows me well knows I’d always say that. This is not for the applause; this is just my conviction. If I caught my wife red-handed with another man, I would ask myself some personal questions — is there any part of me that is lacking? We Africans like to jump to conclusions without clarifying the issues within ourselves, because you could be the reason she’s doing what she’s doing. I’m not justifying her actions, but it could be that you are lacking in communication and other aspects of the relationship that should be given attention, and not divorce.” A man then adds, from an Islamic angle, that a companion of the Prophet told the Prophet his wife was after other men, and was advised to divorce her, but said he loved her, and was told to “carry her with respect.”
That clip is from what is called the AICast Club — a social-media gathering that likes to push all sorts of contentious, controversial ideas into the culture. But I bring it up not only because of that club, but because, if you have been paying attention, this view has been expressed elsewhere in Nigeria recently. You may remember Seun Kuti’s clip — an interview, I believe on TVC’s breakfast programme, that went viral, where he explained the same view: that he would not leave his wife because “cheating does not mean anything,” and that African men are pretending as if cheating isn’t a normal thing in a relationship. And there was a testimony that went viral around the 23rd of August 2026, where a man publicly thanked God for his wife of sixteen years, who stayed after he had abandoned home for hotels and other women; the congregation clapped, and the pastor called it a miracle — while critics, including several women, immediately noted the double standard, that the same story with the sexes reversed would not have produced the same applause. Around the same time, a man stood in a pulpit — said to be at the church of a certain Apostle — and confessed serial infidelity, and the couple renewed their vows; some framed it as humility and repentance, others as another public performance of “she stayed and prayed him back.”
Some have said in the past, to women: if you catch your husband in adultery, what you ought to do is stay in the marriage and pray until he repents and comes back. And many women in the culture have turned it around and said to men: if you catch your wife in adultery, do not let her go, do not be angry, but be humble enough to stay and pray until she repents. That is what that man was suggesting — that if he caught his wife in adultery, he would not be angry, would not think of separation, but sit back and ask, “What did I do wrong?”
Now, is this something we should be applauding? The reason the question matters is that what we have here mixes a few true notes from Scripture with several quieter errors. Somebody says, “If I’m offended, I’ll first do self-examination” — isn’t that scriptural? Somebody says, “I’ll first think of my duty to forgive” — isn’t that the gospel? Somebody says, “I won’t be hasty in coming to conclusions” — isn’t that patience, a fruit of the Spirit? But ideas like this mix those true notes with quieter errors the Scripture does not support — and that is exactly how the culture works to muddy the waters and subvert gospel truths. Understand what subversion is: those who set out to subvert the truth do not announce, “We are fighting this.” They undermine and weaken and destroy a set of ideas without directly saying so. They put forward one idea which, if you accept it, will eventually lead you to reject the idea they actually want to destroy. That is the point in this trend of men and women going on record to say, “If I catch my spouse in adultery, I will not be angry; I will be patient, I will examine myself, I will forgive, I will draw them back” — and of the culture applauding them. We on the Lord’s side, called to be discerning, wise as serpents, should sit back and see that the true notes — self-examination, forgiveness, patience — are mixed with pernicious, quiet errors.
The first error: that adultery is a minor relational hiccup. That is what the trend is trying to build into the consciousness of the culture — “no big deal.” But we on the Lord’s side must remember that the seventh commandment and the teaching of Jesus treat sexual unfaithfulness as a unique violation of the one-flesh covenant. Exodus 20:14, the Ten Commandments. And in Matthew 5, in the Sermon on the Mount, our Lord expanded it to include not just the physical act but even the lustful thought. Jesus Himself names porneia — the Greek word for sexual immorality — as the exception that permits divorce. Why? Because it is not a minor thing. If you read the Old Testament, God Himself said of those who broke faith with the wife of their youth: “What is wrong with you? I was a witness when you took the vows.” So it is a big deal. I am not saying it is an unforgivable sin — indeed it glorifies God when a person deeply wounded is able to forgive. But when the culture celebrates it before it even happens, parading people who say, “Even if my wife did it, I wouldn’t care, or I’d be patient, or I’d forgive,” the culture is subtly suggesting that adultery should no longer be considered a major sin — that it’s nothing. We must not accept that. This is how Satan works — through his demons and his agents in the culture; he is the father of lies, and he deceives.
When Jesus named adultery as an exception permitting divorce, it was not harshness; He said it in recognition that a union marred by adultery has been torn. So a man who says, “I will first ask if something is wrong with me,” can sound humble and win applause from a culture that wants to be free of all moral restraint — but it quietly relocates the primary responsibility away from the one who chose to sleep with someone else. And it suggests a second error: that remaining unrepentant is no big deal. Yes, Christians are required to forgive; but they are not required to pretend the marriage is still intact while the other party continues the same conduct. If you read 1 Corinthians 5 and 6, and Matthew 18, you see that these Scriptures treat unrepentant sexual sin as a matter for church discipline, not indefinite endurance. Have you noticed that in all these clips, you never hear that the adulterous party apologised or repented? Seun Kuti simply said cheating is no big deal; the man in the clip said he would not even ask whether she was sorry, or whether the affair had ended — he would just sit back and think, “What did I do wrong?” So the culture is turning this into the very definition of a godly wife — the woman who bears the adultery and prays until the husband comes back — or a godly husband who is never offended by his wife’s adultery but prays until she repents.
The truth is that hypothetical virtue is cheap. Talk is cheap. It is easy to say, “This is what I would do if I found myself in that situation.” Every Christian who has actually experienced adultery would tell you: pray that you never experience it. Do not misunderstand me — it is to the glory of God, and it takes the Holy Spirit, for anyone to forgive a spouse who has hurt them that deeply; I do not pray ever to be put in that situation, nor to put my wife in it. Any couple helped by the Holy Spirit to overcome it will tell you that you do not joke with something like that. Self-examination is good, but inversion of guilt is not — and that is another subtle lie this trend sells: that it is fine to invert the guilt, “maybe it is me.” That is the whole essence of this programme: to take captive every thought and bring it to obey Christ, from 2 Corinthians 10:5. When we come across arguments and pretensions like this, it is our duty — iron sharpening iron — to demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and to take every thought captive to make it obedient to Christ.
So what should a Christian spouse who has been cheated on do? Be patient, yes. Reflect prayerfully, yes. Find it in himself or herself to pray for the other party, yes. But no one should be found saying, “Adultery means nothing; if it happened, I wouldn’t be hurt.” That is, first, a lie — hypothetical virtue is cheap; and second, adultery is not a minor relational hiccup, and everyone in a marriage should know it. It offends not only the other spouse but God, who said to the people of old, “What is wrong with you, breaking your marriage vows without scruple? I was a witness at your wedding.” This is not to claim that we who say this are perfect or beyond reproach — none of us is; indeed, when our Lord expanded the scope of adultery in Matthew 5, it caught us all in the net. But that should take us to God with humility. Think about it: a person who claims not to be offended by adultery — do you think that person considers God offended by it? “If my husband is not offended, why would God be?” — and so the person will not even go to God in prayer. This trend is inviting the culture to accept adultery as the new normal. The point is not forgiveness — forgiveness is commanded, and comes by the power of the Holy Spirit. The point is the minimisation of sin. And that is where the devil has advanced degrees: he wants to minimise things. The Bible says, be sober, be vigilant, for your adversary the devil prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. May the Lord give us grace, bless our marriages, shield us from such difficult decisions, grant us grace to forgive wrongs — but grant us the discernment to know when the culture is inviting us to embrace falsehood from the father of lies, who has been lying from the beginning.
ON A RANDOM KILLING IN TIMES SQUARE
Next, a story from the United States. There is public reporting of an incident on the 31st of August 2026, around 4 p.m., in New York, where a woman said to be 49 years old pulled two kitchen knives from a Target bag and, in a public space, randomly stabbed two people. She stabbed a 68-year-old man, and about twenty seconds later stabbed a 32-year-old woman in the abdomen. The woman eventually died. This should be a story in any case — that someone randomly brought out kitchen knives in public and stabbed two strangers. But the 32-year-old woman had just celebrated her second wedding anniversary; she was a lawyer, a vice president with Bank of America, on her way home after a day’s work. And a random stranger stabbed her, and she died. The police confronted the 49-year-old woman, spoke with her for about four minutes, tried tear gas which proved ineffective, and eventually shot her when she advanced toward them with the knives, saying she would rather kill the officers than drop the weapons. She died. The police described the stabbings as random, unprovoked, and not terrorism — and that is the scary part: random, unprovoked. Videos have since surfaced of the woman dancing in a manic way, and bringing out the knives, just before she left home, as someone who knew what she intended to do.
It has been suggested she had a history of mental illness — a mother of three, divorced, with a master’s-level psychology background, who occasionally worked in a legal or immigration office, and a long mental-health history including bipolar disorder. People are already digging up her social-media posts, said to include rambling religious writing — including a November 2025 note listing “stabbing others for no reason” among “signs of the end times.” And she eventually did exactly that. Others who have scoured her accounts report references to Satan, to voices, to the persecution of Christians, though her family said they had not seen her act violently toward others before this. And that is a sad lesson: when you come across people writing dark, demonic things, take them seriously. Do not just say, “This person is joking.” Learn to believe people for what they say.
One commenter said she could not imagine the tragedy and grief of the family — and I pray you never experience something like that; it is beyond imagining. A 32-year-old lawyer who had risen to become a vice president at Bank of America, married two years earlier, simply going home, stabbed by a mentally disturbed stranger who randomly picked her. The randomness of it all is the point. And what should it remind us, on the Lord’s side? First, that we live in a fallen world, and we are all exposed to the horrors that come with the fullness of this world — people ask, “What did she do wrong? Why was she the one, randomly?” Second, the reality of demonic influence, of Satan working through so many people. The Bible teaches that the mission of Satan is to steal, to kill and to destroy. A secular society will say, “It’s just mental illness.” But I will tell you the spiritual power behind those who, because of their illness, cause the death and destruction of others: it is the devil. Some will say, “Don’t oversimplify it as spiritual warfare.” And I say: don’t be naïve. Both sides attack the other with the same charge — the secular culture says we oversimplify by invoking spiritual warfare; we say the secular culture is naïve and simplistic to suppose it has no spiritual dimension. The one who controls people who kill, steal and destroy is the devil. That is what the Bible teaches, and that is why, more than ever, we must never live in the delusion that there is no spiritual warfare.
This is not to say that the young woman who was killed was unaware of spiritual warfare — I do not know her spiritual state, and that is not the point. The point is that we live in a fallen world where Satan inhabits the hearts and minds of many; every time you step out of your house, you do not know the spirit controlling the person beside you. And we who are Christians are hated by Satan and his agents, which is why, more than ever, we must plead the blood of Jesus, ask for His presence and protection, and remember those grieving because of the fallenness of this world and the dark spiritual forces that inhabit others and make them do horrible things.
And nobody should hear us affirm spiritual warfare and conclude that we are excusing culpability for wrong — that is not what we are doing. Indeed, the person used by Satan is a victim too. That 49-year-old woman — who, from the videos, was dancing in her home before leaving with two kitchen knives, who wrote in 2025 about stabbing people for no reason — was, in my view, and this is biblical, used by the devil for that purpose; but she was a victim as well, and she has been killed. Satan does not only delight in causing grief to innocent families like that of the 32-year-old lawyer; he delights in killing even the agents he uses. Once he inhabits a person and makes them do horrible things, that person is also a victim — and now that she has been killed, the devil is glad, because his mission is to steal, to kill and to destroy.
This is a time for the church to rally around those thrown into mourning by senseless attacks like this — attacks that make no sense, because you keep asking what that woman did wrong, and why she was randomly picked. There is no way to minister comfort to her loved ones except to pray that the Holy Spirit Himself will comfort them, to remember that we live in a fallen world, to commit ourselves to God’s protection, and to remember our duty to comfort and pray — for those thrown into grief, and also for those possessed by the devil, that the Lord will deliver them, because they too are victims. And to pray, “Lord, hasten the day when Satan will be crushed under the feet of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” I pray comfort for the family of that lady. I have not been able to shake that story; every time I come across it, I wonder how this happens. May the Lord hasten the day when Satan is fully crushed under the feet of our Lord, in Jesus’ name, amen.
ON HEAVENLY VISITS THAT ENTHRONE THE PREACHER
Finally this morning, another video clip — the audio of a popular Nigerian apostle giving a testimony of a spiritual experience. It was posted by a lady who has made a career on social media out of sneering at pastors and preachers who say outlandish things — but I want you to ask whether you think this is outlandish. In the clip he says: “The first time I was taken to heaven this year, there were fourteen of us who were chosen, and it was an exclusive meeting to meet with Jesus. Jesus was standing behind a table of one type of wood. On the table were many scrolls — like the thing they give you at graduation that holds your certificate. As you approach, He gives you instructions and hands you a scroll. This scroll is an anointing that someone walked in previously and is passing over. When I came to where Jesus was, He reached out and brought a scroll. The name of the person on that scroll was Derek Prince. He gave me that scroll and said I have a mandate from heaven in the area of deliverance — a global mandate; anywhere I go, my authority over devils will be obvious. The fourteen had come to the table, received, and gone; He asked me to come back, and I saw many scrolls still on the table… Another time, it was the throne room, high up, shining with light, and everybody was afraid, including me — you couldn’t even approach. And a key was brought on a platter, a golden key: ‘We have been asked to give you this key.’ I picked it up.” He says he still does not know what the key opens.
So this is a preacher telling his congregation: this year I had an exclusive meeting with Jesus; He gave me a scroll bearing the name of Derek Prince — one of the world-famous deliverance teachers — and later, in the throne room, a golden key. Make of it what you will. Why are people sneering? What is actually being claimed? This is not merely a claim of God’s presence in prayer. It paints a detailed heavenly scene: a selected group of fourteen; a distribution of the ministries of earlier teachers to new preachers; a golden key in the throne room; and a public retelling that places the speaker at the centre of the story. It is not “I was praying and felt God’s presence,” nor “I saw a vision,” as Isaiah did. And those who follow this preacher know he has spoken of heavenly visits at other points as well.
Is there a biblical precedent? For some of it, yes — think of Isaiah. Christians are not embarrassed by visions; Scripture is not embarrassed by them. Isaiah said, “In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord” (Isaiah 6), and gave a detailed description. Ezekiel saw the glory by the river. Daniel received visions that made him sick. Stephen, as he died, saw the Son of Man standing. Peter saw a sheet let down from heaven. John, writing Revelation, said he was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day and was told to write what he saw. So visions do occur. But look at the differences. The closest parallel is Paul in 2 Corinthians 12, who wrote that he knew a man in Christ caught up fourteen years earlier — whether in the body or out of it, he did not know — who heard things that cannot be told. Scholars agree Paul was speaking of himself. Yet, knowing the nature of such an experience, he did not boast; he deliberately turned attention away from himself, and immediately added that a thorn was given him in the flesh, so that he would not become conceited. Even Paul did not build his apostolic authority on a tour of heaven.
Now, the sneering. Some sneer because they do not believe in a living God at all — that He exists, that He reveals Himself, that visions occur. For us who love the Lord, that is no standard; we cannot sneer because God is not real, for He is. But others sneer because the pattern is now familiar: a well-known preacher tells of an unverifiable journey and then claims a unique mandate because of it. When the same kind of story keeps arriving from the same kind of platform, people stop giving the benefit of the doubt — they have seen too many so-called “downloads from heaven” that conveniently exalt the speaker and cannot be checked. In this apostle’s account, you do not find the humility of the biblical parallels. Isaiah did not claim majesty — he said, “Woe is me, I am undone; I am a man of unclean lips.” Daniel was sick to his stomach and had to be strengthened. But what we have nowadays are people who go to heaven and are treated like dignitaries, like royalty — the suggestion being, “Even in heaven I am honoured; therefore honour me on earth, or do even more.” I have not found a biblical account of anyone who had such an experience and wrote, “I got there, and I was honoured.” John was there only as a witness — to write and go and tell. Paul saw the vision and immediately received the thorn; he found himself unworthy of it.
So, first, we cannot be embarrassed by visions — they are real; God is real and living, and He reveals Himself and shows visions from time to time. We cannot call a person a fraud simply because he has told of a vision. But we must be discerning: when a claimed vision calls attention to a person, we must ask whether that is in line with biblical precedent — because when preachers call attention to themselves, it is a dangerous thing. Our mission is one thing: to point to Christ, to point to Christ, to point to Christ. The visions Scripture supports point people back to God, not back to the man — not “I have been appointed, elected, chosen; therefore fall in line.” That is dangerous. We are called to test the spirits by the Word of God. The danger in the church today is that people hear anything, and so long as a self-styled preacher said it, they say, “You dare not question; questioning is sin.” That is not true. It is not sinful to fact-check your preachers. The Bereans heard Paul in the morning, went home and searched the Scriptures, and came back to say, “We fact-checked you — you were right.” Fact-check me too. Search the Scriptures: does God act this way? Stephen received honour in heaven — but as he was dying, for the faith; the honour promised to you and me after we have fought and finished the battle. No living person gets such honour as a badge. Ask: does this agree with Scripture, or does it invent a new mechanism of ministry? Does it humble the speaker, or enthrone him? If an account enthrones a speaker, be careful before you embrace it hook, line and sinker — that is not the typical way God works. (The exception is His Son: with Jesus there were many revelations, like the Transfiguration — “This is My beloved Son; listen to Him” — but that was God speaking of His Son.) Every other person who has had a heavenly vision retells it in a way that humbles them. Isaiah did not say, “I alone was invited to see Him seated on the throne, robe flowing, immaculate white, the angels crying.” He said, “I saw it, and I became aware of my sinfulness and unworthiness.”
So ask: can it be examined? Does it send us to Christ and to His Word, or to a man? The Lord never gives visions to send people to some human person; He gives them to send people back to what He Himself has said, or to His Son. Would the apostles have told the story this way? Many Christians say, “Don’t question what preachers say” — that is not biblical, and it is one of the means by which the devil enslaves and entraps many. So: number one, do not become a scoffer who says, “This could never happen.” But at the same time, never be taken in by those who say, “I went to heaven, I was given this mandate, I was honoured — therefore honour me.” Paul, who saw Christ on the road to Damascus and conversed with Him, said, “I will not boast, except in my weaknesses.”
And let me tie it back to the first story. That very Nigerian trend of people saying “adultery is nothing, I’ll easily forgive it,” and this account of a person saying “I was in heaven and honoured, so you should honour me” — both show that falsehood is sold in a subtle way, and we have to be more than vigilant. When our Lord said, “Be watchful,” it calls for vigilance — including vigilance about what we accept. I pray that I do not become one of those who, once they hear a preacher say something, embrace it and say, “This is the gospel truth, this is what I must do.” We must be wise.
I want to thank you so very much for joining me today on GospelBells Radio, On the Lord’s Side — Christian perspectives on news and current events. I hope to be with you again tomorrow by the grace of God. Whatever you do today, please remain firmly on the Lord’s side. God bless you. You are listening to GospelBellsRadio.com, the Christian internet radio with a mission to engage the culture with the mind of Christ. Keep listening, and invite others too. God bless you. Engaging the culture with the mind of Christ.
