ATLANTA — Evangelist Juanita Bynum denied Thursday that she is seeking a reconciliation with her estranged husband, Bishop Thomas Weeks, in an exclusive interview with WSB-TV Channel 2 anchor Monica Pearson.
During the hour-long interview with Pearson, Bynum insisted a series of text messages she sent to Weeks were not an attempt to save their marriage.
“It was not me pursuing Bishop Weeks, and him trying to make me look like some weak, worn woman that wants him back,” said Bynum.
Weeks apologized to his wife in court on Tuesday as he entered a guilty plea to assaulting her and was sentenced to three years probation.
“I want to apologize to my wife for all she’s had to go through,” he said.
Bynum nodded in response and quietly thanked him. The two later walked out of the courthouse together.
“They are in communication and working on their relationship and the status of their marriage,” said Ed Garland, Weeks’ attorney in the criminal case.
But Bynum told Pearson the marriage is over.
“I reached out to him in that attorney’s office, because what I was exemplifying is, the hope of a future, and you let out, your vulnerable feelings at the hope of a future, instead of me waiting to see there’s been change for the future,” she insisted.
Even though the relationship ended in violence Bynum believes it began with love.
“I believe in the beginning Bishop Weeks loved me, I believe Bishop Weeks loves me as much as he knows how at this particular point,” she told Pearson.
The evangelist said she is undergoing counseling. She also revealed that she has several new projects in the works and wants to move on with her ministry and her life.
“Today in the media, I was only accused of loving Bishop Weeks. That’s all I did, that’s all my texts meant and if that’s an accusation, than I’m guilty, I’m guilty of loving him, but I gotta move on, I gotta move on,” Bynum said.
Bynum is a former hairdresser and flight attendant who became a Pentecostal evangelist, author and gospel singer. Weeks is the founder of Global Destiny churches.
The couple wed in a million-dollar, televised ceremony in 2002 and together wrote “Teach Me How to Love You: The Beginnings.”
Bynum filed for divorce from Weeks a month after the attack, citing “cruel treatment” and saying the marriage was “irretrievably broken.” Since then, the two or their lawyers have issued a series of conflicting statements about the initial incident and the couple’s travails.