'Worldwide ministry': T.D. Jakes retirement marks end of era for presidential counselor

USA Today

29-04-2025

'Worldwide ministry': T.D. Jakes retirement marks end of era for presidential counselor
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Dallas megachurch leader announces he will step down
Bishop T.D. Jakes had a heart attack last November in front of his congregation. He announced Sunday that he will be stepping down as leader of the Dallas megachurch.
Fox - 4 News
After roughly three decades as one of most prominent faces of American faith, Bishop T.D. Jakes is leaving his leadership position months after a health scare and amid larger legal battles.
The 67-year-old megachurch pastor announced Sunday he was retiring as senior pastor of Potter's House, a non-denominational Pentecostal megachurch in Dallas, Texas, which has grown into a political and cultural powerhouse.
"I've seen too many men build something and stay so long, that they kill what they build," Jakes said during an April 27 service.
Over the years Jakes' influence has ballooned beyond the walls of his 30,000-member congregation.
While creating an institution with various campuses across the globe that prides itself on community outreach and investing millions into affordable housing and anti-poverty programs, Jakes has become a multimillionaire businessman in part as an author and playwright.
"This is a significant announcement, this is a worldwide ministry," political commentator Roland S. Martin said on his digital program Monday.
'Both sides of the bird': Jake a counselor to presidents in tough times
Over the years Jakes has advised many high-profile individuals in the business, entertainment and civil rights world, but especially noteworthy has been close relationships with presidents across party lines.
When Bill Clinton admitted to having "sinned" in his relationship with the former White House intern Monica Lewinsky almost 30 years ago, for example, the Texas megachurch leader was among the clergy the then-president called upon when seeking the nation's forgiveness.
"I try not to tell presidents how to be presidents," Jakes told Oprah in a 2012 interview.
During the George W. Bush era, Jakes sought to maintain his bipartisan reputation even as more liberal supporters questioned his proximity to the conservative evangelical, saying he was a "minister to both sides of the bird." He petitioned the White House to boost funding in aid to African nations, and drew attention to the lack of sufficient federal disaster response for the victims devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
"It is not so important what we say, it is important what we do," Jakes said while staring at Bush during a 2005 prayer service at the National Cathedral.
Barack Obama embraced Jakes early in his ascension to the Oval Office after cutting ties with his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, during the 2008 campaign. He later invited the Texas pastor to his inauguration in 2009 and the two had several prayer counsels via phone and in-person.
Obama said Jakes makes Americans, "more compassionate, and more loving as a country," in a December 2015 Variety interview.
A Hollywood force with faith-based content to boot
Outside of the megachurch, part of the reason Jakes became a household name was a slate of original TV movies and a short-lived talk show that was a hit among Black audiences in particular.
He produced a series of Lifetime films in his 'Seven Deadly Sins' anthology based on books by Christian fiction author Victoria Christopher Murray. The films starred Michelle Williams, Tina Knowles, Keri Hilson, Kandi Burrus, Romeo Millo, LisaRaye McCoy and Eric Benét.
A 2009 film based on his 2006 novel "Not Easily Broken" starred Academy Award-nominee Taraji P. Henson and Morris Chestnut. He also has pursued business ventures together with family friend and billionaire Tyler Perry, including Jakes' 2021 land purchase near the Hollywood megaproducer's Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta.
According to 11Alive and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the pair purchased over 130 acres of land at shuttered Army base Fort McPherson in the city.
Jakes, a four-time Grammy nominee garnered one win for best gospel choir or chorus album for 'A Wing And A Prayer' at the 46th Grammy Awards in 2004.
Jakes was host of 'The T.D. Jakes Show,' which aired on select Tegna stations across the country and re-aired on the Oprah Winfrey Network. The show aired for one season in 2016.
Jakes has stoked controversy, conspiracies for Diddy association
But as many heap praise upon the bishop as he enters retirement, he also has attracted a fair share criticism and been dogged by online conspiracy theories after serving as spiritual mentor to Sean 'Diddy' Combs, the embattled music mogul set to stand trial May 5 on federal sex-crimes charges.
Jakes is mentioned in a March 2024 amended lawsuit filed by ex-producer Rodney 'Lil Rod' Jones Jr. accusing Combs of sexual assault. The suit claims the hip-hop heavyweight used the spiritual leader to sanitize allegations levied his way.
The lawsuit claims Jones has 'irrefutable' evidence that Combs 'planned to leverage his relationship with Bishop T.D. Jakes, to soften the impact on his public image of Cassie Ventura's lawsuit' after Combs' ex-girlfriend Casandra 'Cassie' Ventura Fine's landmark lawsuit in November 2023.
Jakes once hosted a weekly Sunday sermon series 'Kingdom Culture with T.D. Jakes' for Combs' former TV network Revolt TV in 2021. But his association with Combs has dissipated in recent years.
Six months after stepping down at Revolt, a media company he co-founded, Combs sold his remaining shares amid piling legal issues in June 2024.
'You're looking at a miracle': Retirement comes after heart attack in pulpit
For Jakes and his supporters, the decision to retire is just as startling as the bishop suffering a heart attack last November while delivering a sermon.
The footage posted on social media showed Jakes pausing and suddenly shaking as parishioner gathered around him. Potter's House initially downplayed what had occurred as a "slight health incident," but he later revealed how close he had come to death.
"You're looking at a miracle," Jakes said in a video address a month after the medical emergency.
Jakes was met with a rousing standing ovation when he returned to the pulpit for a New Year's Even sermon where he spoke for nearly an hour and revealed additional details about his health scare.
Sarah Jakes Roberts, family's youngest daughter, named successor
Long seen as heir apparent to her family's legacy, Sarah Jakes Roberts will take the helm of Potter's House alongside her second husband and author Touré Roberts, whom she married in November 2014.
Observers noted the significance of Jakes passing the torch to his daughter, which many believe will add to his legacy among Black churchgoers.
"In the church, it is rare, incredibly rare, for a woman to take over a church of this magnitude," Kellye Beathea, a communications strategist, said on Roland Martin Unfiltered.
Jakes Roberts, a quasi-social media influencer, showcases fitness workouts, sermons and styled looks to her 4 million Instagram and TikTok followers. Touré, too, boasts hundreds of thousands of social media fans. They share five children from previous marriages and one together.
Named a Time100 Next honoree in 2023, Jakes Roberts is CEO of Women Evolve which hosts a popular women's empowerment conference each year attended by thousands of women. The 2025 edition is slated for this summer in Atlanta.
At just 14, the second-generation pastor was pregnant with her first child, revealing the news to her powerful parents.
'I thought that (the pregnancy) was just the worst thing in the world that could possibly happen to me. And now that same daughter is ministering all over the world,' her dad told ABC's Paula Faris in 2019.
Contributing: Julia Gomez and Jonathan Limehouse