Celebrities, fellow pastors and his Dallas megachurch’s next-generation leaders celebrated Bishop T.D. Jakes’ 50th anniversary of ministry during a service Sunday (Sept. 13), as he thanked his congregation and family for their support during a tenure in which he “dared to be talked about.”

“We can imagine, but we don’t know how much it cost you to let your light shine,” Pastor Touré Roberts told Jakes, his father-in-law, in front of the congregation. “But you did it. You dared to be different. You dared to be talked about. You dared to be ostracized. You risked it all in order to let it, and we want to say thank you.”

Over more than three hours, Jakes’ ministry trajectory was described — often via archival and recent video, and with musical interludes — as speakers recalled his youthful interest in preaching, his first church in Montgomery, West Virginia, and, eventually, the 1,500 people who joined The Potter’s House of Dallas, his megachurch, on its first Sunday in 1996.

“I am standing in the exceeding abundant grace of God that has done more than I could ever imagine,” Jakes, a onetime storefront preacher, told more than 5,300 congregants gathered in the sanctuary. An additional 64,000 watched the service on YouTube as of Monday afternoon.

Gratitude for Jakes also came via video from a range of celebrities from church, entertainment and political circles, including media moguls Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry, and fellow Texas pastors John Hagee and Joel and Victoria Osteen.

“It’s been a pleasure working with you and knowing you through these years,” said the Rev. Andrew Young, a civil rights leader and former United Nations ambassador. “And every time I hear you speak, you stir something in my soul. And when I think of your ministry, I realize how much you mean to so many people.”

Jakes, 69, turned over the leadership of the nondenominational church to his daughter, Pastor Sarah Jakes Roberts, and Touré Roberts in April of last year. They were officially installed as senior co-pastors three months later. He has continued to serve as chair of the boards of the church and the T.D. Jakes Group, which includes his foundation and enterprises.

He also started a new podcast, “NXT Chapter with T.D. Jakes,” late last year and is expected to speak in October at a conference of the Good Soil Movement, an entrepreneurial organization he founded in 2023.

From the mid-1980s to mid-1990s, Jakes expanded his ministry from a West Virginia church to leading revivals across the state and then the nation.

Pastor Lawrence Robinson, who moved with Jakes from West Virginia to Dallas in the 1990s, recalled in a video that the minister once had the hair and fashion style of Black popular culture in the 1970s — “Jheri curls and bell bottoms and stacks,” or chunky-heeled shoes. And, he was so committed to the Bible “he’d be in the woods reading the Word,” Robinson said.

Career highlights included his “Woman, Thou Art Loosed” enterprise, related to the healing words of Jesus to a woman with an 18-year disabling condition. That expanded from a Sunday school class to cassette tapes to stadium events. The title of one of his dozens of books, it eventually became the focus of a play and a 2004 movie.

Throughout the years, Jakes has had numerous other business enterprises, including other movies and affordable housing projects in the United States. He also founded United MegaCare, a not-for-profit organization that works to enhance health, education and disaster relief worldwide.

During the service, his T.D. Jakes Foundation announced plans to donate $25,000 to support an orphanage and school in Nairobi, Kenya, and to give another $25,000 to the Jakes Divinity School, an online institution he founded in 2019.

Jakes’ family members acknowledged that beyond or behind the accomplishments, he experienced challenges and controversy over the 50 years.

Less than two years ago, Jakes suffered what he later revealed was a massive heart attack in front of his congregation. The day after, his lawyers filed a defamation lawsuit on his behalf, arguing a Pennsylvania minister, Duane Youngblood, had falsely accused Jakes of attempted sexual assault. In October 2025, Jakes informed the court the lawsuit had been voluntarily dismissed “by consent of all parties” involved in the litigation.

Sarah Jakes Roberts said her father’s legacy would continue.

“Your legacy is not coming to an end; it is just beginning,” she said. “Generation after generation are going to reap the harvest of what God has done on the inside of your life. The only thing we want you to do, in between reaping the harvest and sowing again, is to find moments of rest.”

Earlier in the service, Pastor Paul Adefarasin, founder of House on the Rock, a Nigeria-based church, expressed gratitude to Jakes for being a role model for clergy across the globe to expand their work beyond traditional church walls.

“We want to say thank you on behalf of how you have reshaped the pattern of ministry,” he told Jakes, who was seated in the front row next to his wife, Serita Jakes, for most of the event. “You taught us not to be locked up in church — to get the salt out of the shaker and get the light out of underneath the bush and then put it on the mountain.”

The event’s international focus included flags being carried onto the stage, representing more than 20 countries with which Jakes has interacted. A choir sang “Let’s Just Praise the Lord” in English, Spanish and French.

Jakes, who spoke for about 18 minutes near the end of the service, spent much of his time at the microphone thanking his family, his colleagues and his church.

“We built something that God said he wanted in the earth, and I want to applaud each and every one of you who pressed your way today and yesterday and the day before to be here,” he said. “The Potter’s House is never just Bishop Jakes. It never was, and it never will be.”

He also noted the recent death of singer-songwriter Dolly Parton, describing her “brilliance” and stating the words of one of her most well-known songs that became a global hit when recorded by singer Whitney Houston.

“So today, because I am so speechless, I want the Potter’s House to know I will always — I will always love you,” Jakes said.

Article written by Adelle M. Banks and originally appeared on ReligionNews.com.