The Potter’s House shone brightly on New Year’s Eve as its founder, Bishop TD Jakes, returned to the Dallas megachurch’s stage for the first time since suffering what his church called an “event little health” in November.
Shortly after Tuesday night’s packed service began, a video was played on stage showing Jakes’ return. Clips of news broadcasts announcing Jakes’ health scare played before a line of people repeated versions of the message: “Welcome back.”
Jakes entered the hall to hear the sound of clapping from his congregation.
“I can’t tell you how happy I am to be in the house of Jehovah tonight; I remembered you,” he said.
During a November service at his church, Jakes began to shake after finishing a prayer, and was soon surrounded on stage by a group of men in suits as cheers could be heard from the congregation.
The Potter House has yet to explain what caused the health scare, although Jakes said on social media in November that it wasn’t a stroke.
A week into the service after the incident, Jakes appeared in a video broadcast and said he was “feeling great and not in pain.”
“Most of you don’t realize you’re looking at a miracle,” he said in the video. “I faced a life-threatening crisis, I was rushed to the ICU; I had emergency surgery. I survived the surgery. I’m back.”
‘Standing here as a witness’
During the New Year’s Eve service, Jakes began his hour-long lecture by talking more about health scares.
“If all the odds were against you, and if they couldn’t hold you, and if you didn’t know anyone and everyone said you couldn’t, I’d wait here is the proof,” he said.
“I’m not coming like Bishop Jakes; I came as Bishop Lazarus, to let you know that all things are possible with God,” Jakes said, referring to the man in the Bible who was resurrected from the dead.
Jakes thanked his church for praying for him. He said: “You have entered into spiritual warfare. “You fought… you spoke in tongues[s]you cried, you prayed, you won, you danced, you lay down, and every time you did it, death had to come back to me.”
“They had raised the oxygen in my nose. I was breathing in what you were breathing out, child,” he said.
‘You need the Lord’
During the rest of his lecture, Jakes reflected on the past year, looked ahead to the coming year and repeatedly returned to the phrase “you need the Lord.” He described 2024 as a “tough, tough year,” saying “clickbait, artificial intelligence, outlandish rumors.”
In late 2023 and early 2024, many videos on TikTok, YouTube and other social media platforms spread rumors about Jakes’ alleged relationship with Sean “Diddy” Combs.
In May 2024, the fact-checking website Snopes said that videos spreading “false and baseless rumors” about Jakes and Combs, some with hundreds of thousands of views, at least made with artificial intelligence.
Combs has been accused of sexual assault and sex trafficking in a series of lawsuits since November 2023.
After Jakes’ sermon, award-winning gospel singer Reverend Mike Jr. he performed several of his best songs accompanied by loud drums, strobe lights and a group of people playing other songs. At one point, many members of the audience held hands and jumped up and down as the gospel singer shouted.
As midnight approached, the clock on the screen counted down to the new year as Jakes’ daughter, Sarah Jakes Roberts, asked for God’s blessings in a voice that rose to a fever pitch.
To end the night, the church gathered to watch several minutes of fireworks in the building’s parking lot.
Verenda Harper has been going to church since she first attended a New Year’s Day service 14 years ago. Jakes’ sermon left him in tears. He said: “I was there when this happened, so to see him walk on stage alive and breathing, still there – it did my soul and my spirit well. “
Hubert Robinson has attended the church and its New Year’s Eve service for several years. “God allowed him [Jakes] to be restored and have the strength to return to serve God’s people,” said Robinson. “He was able to encourage the saints to know that with faith in God, having faith in God, you can be restored.”
Adrian Ashford covers faith and religion in North Texas for The Dallas Morning News in partnership with Report for America.
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