Bishop T.D. Jakes is shedding light on the medical emergency he suffered mid-sermon in November 2024.
During a recent interview with Craig Melvin on TODAY, the famous pastor of The Potter’s House in Dallas revealed that he suffered a massive heart attack.
“I didn’t really realize what was happening to me onstage until I got to the hospital in an ambulance and fussing that it happened onstage, by the way, because I didn’t want it to happen, and the doctor leaned over my ear and said, ‘You had a massive heart attack,'” he said on the Wednesday’s show.
Jakes, 67, said he had no idea he was having a heart attack because he “one of the symptoms that they say” typically occur before the medical emergency.
“The reason I didn’t realize it was because I had none of the symptoms that they say,” the pastor explained. “No numbness, no sharp pain, no anything. I just kind of drifted off to sleep. I didn’t know what it was, but I almost died.”
“(The doctor) said five minutes later, I’d have been dead on arrival,” he continued. “The right side of my heart had completely stopped getting blood at all.”
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While delivering an inspirational message at The Potter’s House, a denominational Christian megachurch in Dallas, Jakes dropped his microphone and fell silent.
He then started involuntarily shaking in his seat before church officials rushed to the stage to offer support, a viral video that captured the moment showed.
“As long as I was up preaching, I felt fine,” he said. “But when I sat down, the adrenaline dropped, and it exposed the fact that I was preaching with half of my heart closed through a clot. And they had to go get it.”
Jakes said it’s “hard” for him to look back at the video.
“They had to claw the microphone out of my hand. But in my mind, I was in a quiet, peaceful, serene, white-enveloped, cloud-enveloped space,” he recalled.
“I was on my way out,” he continued. “Afterwards in retrospect, it was such a privilege to stand on the other side, to get a little glimpse of what it might be like, or at least what it was like in that moment for me. I think it was absolutely amazing.”
Despite the heart attack, Jakes said he has no plans to slow down and is looking forward to launching a new podcast, sitting down with Oprah Winfrey at the 2025 Good Soil Forum, and continuing to deliver inspiring sermons onstage.
“I’m getting faster because one, I’m older. Two, I’m grateful. Three, I’ve got something to say,” he said.
