(RNS) — Less than a year after suffering a massive heart attack, megachurch founder T.D. Jakes is launching a podcast featuring celebrities and influencers discussing transformative points of transition in their lives.
“NXT Chapter with T.D. Jakes” will premiere on the iHeartMedia radio network Friday (Nov. 14) with an interview with media mogul Oprah Winfrey.
“After experiencing a profound shift in my own life and career, I knew I was not alone,” Jakes says in a trailer for the podcast. “These moments of change, challenge and transformation touch all of us. That’s why I created this podcast to sit down with people from all walks of life — leaders, artists, entrepreneurs, athletes — and talk about the moments that changed everything for all of them.”
Others scheduled to appear in the first season of the show include actor-director Denzel Washington, rapper Jeezy and Pastor Sarah Jakes Roberts, Jakes’ daughter and successor as co-leader of The Potter’s House, in Dallas.
Jakes’ podcast comes as the popular preacher and bestselling author has experienced some transitions of his own.
In April Jakes, 68, announced to the Potter’s House congregation that he was turning over its leadership to Roberts and Pastor Touré Roberts, his son-in-law. In the preceding months, attorneys for Jakes had filed a defamation lawsuit on his behalf relating to accusations of sexual assault dating to years before. The suit argued that the accusations, made by a Pennsylvania minister named Duane Youngblood, were false.
Bishop T.D. Jakes, right, speaks at The Potter’s House with his wife, Serita, from left; daughter, Sarah Jakes Roberts; and her husband, Touré Roberts, April 27, 2025, in Dallas. (Video screen grab)
But in October of this year Jakes informed the Pennsylvania federal district court where the case was filed that it had been voluntarily dismissed “by consent of all parties” involved in the litigation.
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Dustin Pusch, one of Jakes’ lawyers in the case, said Jakes had prompted the end of the case, The Dallas Morning News reported. “The Court has consistently ruled in Bishop Jakes’s favor throughout this matter, and with the established record in the case proving the utter falsity of these claims, there is nothing further to pursue,” Pusch told the newspaper in a statement.
“In the interest of judicial efficiency and closure for all involved, Bishop Jakes has chosen to dismiss the remaining claims and focus his attention on continuing the global ministry and community work that have defined his life for nearly five decades.”
A document that accompanied The Potter’s House’s announcement about its changing leadership said it was “absolutely not” related to any wrongdoing by T.D. Jakes.
On the last Sunday of November 2024, as he preached to his congregation, Jakes had suffered a heart attack while preaching to his congregation. Jakes did not disclose the cause of what his ministry initially called “a slight health incident” for four months, only revealing it was a massive heart attack on NBC’s “Today Show” in March. “The right side of my heart had completely stopped getting blood at all,” he said on the broadcast.
Having come through his own transitions, Jakes said in the podcast trailer that he’s ready to explore others’ life-changing experiences.
“These are real conversations about resilience, reinvention, purpose, and faith, about what it takes to keep going when everything around you is telling you to stop,” he said. “You will hear how a career setback became a calling, how a moment of loss sparked a mission, how unexpected transitions turn into unexpected blessings.”
The announcement of the podcast said that Jakes will also be telling more of his own story. “Several episodes will reflect on his recovery, renewed perspective, and the clarity of purpose that continues to shape this next season of his life and work,” it reads.
Others to be featured in the weekly episodes are former Starbucks chair Mellody Hobson and Jason Wilson, co-founder of The Yunion, a faith-based nonprofit supporting youth and families in Detroit.
Jakes, once the leader of a West Virginia storefront church, has been featured on a Time magazine cover and become known for a wide range of entrepreneurial pursuits, including real estate and entertainment.
“I’ve spent my life speaking to people’s souls,” Jakes said in an announcement about the podcast. “Now, I want to sit with their stories.”
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