Reverend Wilfredo De Jesus is Senior Pastor of New Life Covenant Church, one of the fastest growing churches in Chicago.
Guest Information
Wilfredo “Choco” De Jesus
Website: www.mynewlife.org
Twitter: @pastorchoco
Book: Stay the Course
New Life Covenant
3400 W. Division St.
Chicago, IL 60651
Bio
Reverend Wilfredo De Jesus is Senior Pastor of New Life Covenant Church, one of the fastest growing churches in Chicago. He is endearingly known as Pastor Choco. Wilfredo was born and raised in Chicago’s Humboldt Park community. It seemed his choices were few and his future held little promise. When he was 14 years old, Wilfredo applied for a city summer job and was prepared to clean streets; instead he was assigned to work at a small neighborhood church with the children’s day camp. Wilfredo showed up to work daily and was surprised by the youth who loved Jesus. By the end of summer, he was led to Jesus and received Him as his Lord and Savior. He remained in the same church for over 20 years before he was appointed Senior Pastor in July 2000. Since then the church has grown from a weekly attendance of 120 to 17,000 globally through church plants and more than 130 ministries reaching the most disenfranchised-the broken hearted to gang members. He is the founder and Executive Director of New Life Family Services, a nonprofit agency that operates a homeless shelter for women with children. In 2013, De Jesus was named one of TIME magazine’s “100 Most Influential People” in the world. He has also written three books. Wilfredo lives in Humboldt Park community of Chicago with his wife Elizabeth and they have three adult children.