TD Jakes: ‘We like our heroes dead’

By Leonardo Blair, Senior Features Reporter Wednesday, January 17, 2024

Bishop T.D. Jakes preaches at the Joint New Year’s Revival at First Baptist Church of Glenarden International in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, on January 5, 2024. | Screengrab/YouTube/ TD Jakes Ministries

Megachurch pastor and businessman T.D. Jakes lamented that “we like our heroes dead” during a recent revival service in Maryland, where he spoke about the death of Moses and the transition of power to Joshua.

Preaching from Joshua 1:1-6, at the 2024 Joint New Year’s Revival service at the First Baptist Church of Glenarden International in Maryland on Jan. 5, Jakes appeared to give some of the same advice he recommended for himself on Christmas Eve, following an unverified report that cast innuendo about his sexuality and relationship with music mogul and producer Diddy that his team has dismissed as “unequivocally false and baseless.”

“I’m almost out of time, but I need to deputize you to help me to preach. The person beside you has been going through hell and high water but I want you to shake them and say step over it,” Jakes told the packed Maryland megachurch as the congregation cheered and he intermittently broke out in glossolalia.

“Step over it. Step over it. Step over it. Step over it. Step over it. Step over it. Step over it,” he said. “The Lord said step over it. Whatever it is, step over it. God has given you the city. Open your mouth and praise.”

The unverified report that became a trending topic on social media last month accused Jakes of being a participant at sex parties hosted by Diddy, whose real name is Sean Combs, and other sexual misconduct, in the wake of a recently-settled lawsuit in which R&B singer Cassie accused Combs of rape, as well as repeated physical abuse over nearly a decade.

In the explosive lawsuit, Cassie, whose real name is Casandra Ventura, alleged that shortly after she met Combs in 2005 at age 19, he began a controlling and abusive relationship with her in which she was given drugs, beaten, and forced to have sex with male prostitutes as he filmed. Combs allegedly hosted the orgies at high-end hotels across the U.S.

Tuff News TV host Germaine McKinley would subsequently claim at the end of a 37-minute video on YouTube that he received an email from an unnamed source alleging that Cassie turned over to investigators a burner phone that belonged to Kim Porter, the late model and mother of Diddy’s children, who died in 2018. Cassie also allegedly shared a USB device containing recordings of Diddy’s alleged “sex parties,” where he reportedly hosted several powerful people, including Jakes.

“I’m also told that multiple male escorts corroborated the fact that T.D. Jakes [has] slept with multiple men at Diddy’s parties and abroad,” the alleged unnamed source claimed. “It’s also been said that a young male has acquired a lawyer to represent him as he is set to sue Jakes for an incident that took place when he was just 16 years old.”

The video’s source alleges that the minor, whose family attended The Potter’s House until he left in 2015, was forced to perform a sex act on Jakes. The source further alleged that the boy’s family was paid off to keep what happened quiet, but he now intends to seek his own justice as an adult.

On Christmas Eve, Jakes called his accusers “liars” and noted that even “if everything was true, all I got to do is repent sincerely from my heart.”

“The worst that could happen, if everything was true, all I got to do is repent sincerely, from my heart. There’s enough power in the blood to cover all kinds of sin. I don’t care what it is, the blood would fix it. But I ain’t got to repent about this,” Jakes declared.

“All I got to do is step over top of it and keep on going on. I’m not in trouble. I’m talking about the power of the blood. Amen. Thank you, Jesus. I have used it, and I will use it again. But I ain’t gotta use it for that. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. Whenever I need it, it’s available to me. And it’s available to you. And you can have it when you need it. But you don’t have to plead the blood if you didn’t do the crime.”

Jakes, who leads The Potter’s House megachurch in Dallas, Texas, also serves as the chairman and CEO of the T.D. Jakes Group, which less than a year ago signed a 10-year strategic partnership with Wells Fargo that “could result in up to $1 billion in capital and financing” from the bank “as well as grants from the Wells Fargo Foundation, with the goal of revitalizing neighborhoods, fostering economic opportunity and creating long-term change in communities most in need.”

The T.D. Jakes group is described as “a global conglomerate that’s worked for more than four decades at the intersection of mission, ministry and marketplace to solve society’s problems through strategic alliances creating equity and providing solutions for underrepresented and underserved communities.”

In his message at the revival service which he titled “Pivot to Possess,” Jakes discusses the transition of leadership of the Israelites after the death of Moses to Joshua. He declared at the start of his message that: “This isn’t a sermon. This is a word from God.”

“It is at Mount Nebo that I imagine that Moses was carried away and the people were left at the bottom of the mountain weeping for the prophet that they had murmured against.

“If you’re taking notes, be sure to write this down: we like our heroes dead. If you want to be famous and you want to be great, die. Cause the moment you die, the people who were hating on you all your life and murmuring and complaining, talking about you didn’t produce enough water, and you didn’t do enough this and you didn’t do enough that, once you die, all of a sudden they’re posting and tweeting and hollering and shouting and yelling. Because people, we like our heroes dead,” the televangelist said.

“Dr. King didn’t get real popular till he died. In his lifetime, some of the very people he was fighting for were trying to kill him because we like dead heroes. They don’t put you on money till you’re dead. They don’t put your face on a coin until you’re dead. They don’t generally make a post stamp until you’re dead. We want to build monuments around dead people.”