Israel and Adrienne are moving on to make things new.
One of the Christian communities most controversial couples next to Meagan Good and her new husband DeVon Franklin are engaged after dating for under a year. Israel Houghton and Adrienne Bailon are planning to tie the knot.
The couple confirmed they were dating back in April, almost immediately after Israel announced his divorce from his wife of 20 years. Adrienne Bailon addressed the issue on her daytime talk show gig The Real after speculation Houghton was still married, which Bailon refuted by confirming the marriage was over. Israel stated on social media that his marriage had been over for 5 years due to his infidelity
The gospel artist has worked within Joel Olsteen‘s ministries for 15 years at his Lakewood Church in Houston, TX where Isreal and Meleasa Houghton along with their three children were pillars in the church community. Houghton’s prominence grew as a well-known multi-grammy award winning songwriter and producer. Recently scoring a grammy award for Best Gospel Album in 2015 for Covered: Alive In Asia – Israel & New Breed and past songs like “Turn It Around” and “Every Prayer”.
When word got out about Israel’s new relationship with the pop-singer/talk show host, Houghton made it clear that Adrienne was not involved with the ending of his marriage. “My marriage had been over for quite some time before going public with my divorce announcement. Where I shared, or as some have pointed out ‘over-shared’ my failure in my marriage… From over 5 years prior. It seems to be simple math that I had not even yet met Adrienne during the time my marriage was falling apart.” said Isreal.
As the singer-songwriter attempted to minimize the damage to his reputation, reports began to surface that Olsteen’s church was firing Israel from their music ministry and ended up removing him from their website. However, new reports, from church representatives, say Houghton has taken a voluntary leave of absences and is free to return at any time.
Miss Bailon is not without her own questionable behavior. She was previously engaged to Lenny Santiago a Roc Nation executive for 8 months and dated him for 6 years. Israel and Adrienne met during the filming of I’m in Love with a church girl, a movie Houghton was producing at the time. Incidentally, Israel and Meleasa Houghton & Adrienne Bailon and Lenny Santiago were all friends hanging out with each other on occasion.
At first glance, it appears the couple rushed into a romantic relationship – by dating right after Adrienne’s engagement and Israel’s divorce ended around the same time. Leading us to wonder if their previous relationships turned for the worse because of their new romance.
Hopefully, Israel and Adrienne’s relationship will last – if not, they will be adding, even more, problems to this already complicated scenario.
The couple appears stronger than ever and their bond has deepened amongst all of the controversies. You can see the ring below from the night of the proposal in Paris, France.
