Anne Reed
AFA Journal staff writer
May 2021 – Choices have continually narrowed for those desiring to honor God in what they watch on a screen. Many have dropped their subscriptions to Netflix, Amazon Prime, and other streaming platforms on which sexual depravity and all forms of spiritual darkness and deception permeate the programs.
In addition to movies, TV programming has become increasingly less virtuous in recent decades. As families find themselves inundated with content conflicting with their values, what could serve them better than to bring redemptive elements to television?
AFA Journal interviewed the leaders of a streaming platform that set out to do just that in early 2020. Its name – Redeem TV.
Lockdown launch
“We launched during COVID-19 lock-downs last year in March,” Bill Curtis, president of Redeem TV, told AFA Journal. As movie theaters were closing and more people across the globe were accessing streaming platforms, Redeem TV started with about 700 media content titles. It now offers about 2,000 titles and has well over 100,000 subscribers.
Entertaining and edifying documentaries, dramas, Bible studies, episodic series, and children’s features are offered at no cost to the viewer. However, viewers who choose to support Redeem TV through monetary donations help to expand the content base while gaining access to a subset of new releases. In just over a year, donors have helped Redeem TV nearly triple its number of titles available for streaming.
“Bill and I began discussions about five years ago on how to do a streaming service that would reach people with responsible resources,” explained Matt Oser, vice president of sales and marketing. “So we became a nonprofit organization that allowed us to offer streaming to the world for free while funding the ministry with donations.”
That faith-based generosity has already proven successful through the operational values of Redeem TV’s parent organization, Christian History Institute (CHI), which also offers Christian History magazine as a free downloadable resource (christianhistoryinstitute.org/magazine). (See AFAJournal, 10/14.)
Mission minded
Redeem TV’s mission “to produce and distribute quality visual media that communicates the gospel in effective and relevant ways to contemporary audiences” is celebrated in its online forums.
“We have people from around the world expressing how Redeem TV has touched them, helped their families, ministries, the church,” explained Oser. “We actually review and evaluate as a team every comment on the site and every email that is sent. We look at what films are being watched and how they are affecting people.”
As Christians are drawn to Redeem TV as a safe, go-to platform for entertaining and edifying content, it is also serving as a valuable educational resource. While Redeem TV has not set out to cater to homeschoolers, many home educators have been drawn to the site.
Family focused
CHI created an animated series called Torchlighters in 2005 and is now working on the 20th episode.
“It’s a series specifically for 8- to 12-year-olds that gives an alternative to entertainment and sports heroes,” said Curtis, “people like Jim Elliott, William Tyndale, John Bunyan, and Eric Liddell. When we made that series available for free, a lot of homeschoolers signed up.”
“And in the coming months, we’re creating a site where we’ll have behind-the-scenes information on productions in the works and how people can provide funding for particular programs,” Oser added with excitement.
Not only does Redeem TV provide Christian entertainment and educational content with family values and strong moral character. It also offers interactive community and the ability to participate in the platform’s growth. 
Find a free family-friendly movie
▶ Viewers can sign up at redeemtv.com with an email address to watch free titles.
▶ Access to additional new releases can be gained with a $5 per month donation.
