Nollywood Actress and Evangelist Tonto Dikeh, has shared that she almost became a pastor at 17 while addressing misconceptions about her faith journey.
Speaking on Real Talk With Kike with host Kikelomo Atanda-Owo posted to Instagram on Oct 22, 2026, the Actress said her walk with Christ did not begin recently as many assume:
“Everything I said God told me; he told me in private. There’s a very big misconception about when I came out to when I gave my life to Christ. Let’s not mistake the fact that I’ve always been in Christ, to the point where I was going to be ordained a pastor. So I knew God at 17.”
She stressed that everything she says God told her was communicated privately, and that her public emergence as an evangelist was not the start of her walk with God:
“When I came out was not the time that I rededicated my life to God. That was the time when God had to take me through… all the things I say God told me, it has to be private. It was a private praise that bettered the public announcement.”
She described that earlier period as a “pruning stage” – a private time where God was working on her before her public ministry.
This is not the first time the Actress have made such revelation in January, early this year, she had said she nearly became a pastor at 19 but walked away from that path after attending church since leaving secondary school.
She acknowledged life’s struggles had caused a period of distance from her faith before she returned.
In August 2026, she launched her interdenominational fellowship, New Wine Prophetic Tabernacle (NWPT) in Abuja, describing it as an “altar, spiritual home, and global movement of consecrated believers”.
In a gospel event in Tanzania, she gave a deeper testimony about her past:
“At the midst of trying to navigate life, I’ve dipped my hands in so much filth and dirt, I’ve joined a cult, I’ve worked with a demon so hard. I know who he is, and I know that he doesn’t have anything for me anymore.”
She said God told her: “I’ll take you back and clean you up. I’ll put you on altars to preach my gospel.”
She also said her first assignment from God was to “clean His house” – which she initially questioned since she has staff who maintain her home, but said God told her it would cleanse her from the inside out.
In March, she also dropped the title “King” from her public name after 8 years, asking to be addressed as “Evangelist Tonto Dikeh”, saying it came from obedience to the Holy Spirit.
Most recently, she also denied rumors that she suffered complications from a Brazilian Butt Lift surgery in Enugu, saying her surgery went well and her health is “top-notch.”
