One More Chapter Closes...

closingMy time as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of PureFlix.com has come to an end though the business will continue with gusto.

What started five years ago as a simple consulting favor to my colleague Linda Blazy, turned into a full time gig, building and developing a team of employees and partners, whom together, successfully launched and grew PureFlix.com into the world's largest Faith, Family, and Fun streaming video service with a vision to influence culture for Christ through media.

Besides building and streaming a catalog of more than 10,000 videos to all sorts of Internet connected devices, bringing entertainment and faith-based teaching to people and families everywhere without the language, sex, and violence that has become so prominent in so much of today’s media entertainment, PureFlix.com also helped fund families ready to adopt babies via Adopt Together, supported Veterans programs across the USA via Reboot Combat Recovery, and devoted a portion of each month's marketing budget to helping fund many other organizations and people capable of doing good in our world.

To be able to deploy hard-earned, secular-world, business building skills to serve the faith and do good in the world at the same time, was a most unusual reality for me given how the secular world had for years taught me to totally eliminate “faith” from my business thinking. Instead, PureFlix.com proved to me that marrying a faith-forward-focus with hard-nosed business and data-driven skill sets, could work and thrive in a manner that the secular world would be astounded by. That’s a lesson I’m very thankful to have learned!

There are a few key PureFlix.com team members whom I wish to sincerely and personally thank for their efforts over the years:

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Amber Paulsen Debbie Stackis
Andrew Ameduri Dena Spoklie
Ashley Kelly Franklin Santagate
Billy Hallowell Jim Schubert
Brian Pancarik Kelly Tinsley
Cali Testerman Kristy Resch
Cris Fastrup Linda Blazy
David Migdal Marc Beckwitt
  Yovonne Jenkins

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many of these good people are still working at PureFlix, while others have moved onward. Regardless, all of them to a person, exhibited and shared their servant's heart. I was truly blessed to serve with and learn from them. Thank you all.



Of course, no team of people, no matter how strong, functions without outside expert partners and PureFlix had some of the very best in the industry come alongside at just the right time.

A few of these notable partners include:

These outside partners delivered skills and lessons at just the right time in the development of the PureFlix.com business.

Many of these partners simultaneously delivered lessons that spoke directly to my own heart; two such lessons include:

  • Ken Ham challenging me directly, “if you take the stance that Genesis, the very first book in the Bible, is just a fairy tale, how can you logically profess that all the other books in the Bible are true?”

    That single question sent me on a quest, reading the Bible in a way I had never experienced before. It was the right question at exactly the right time and I’m indebted to Ken and the Answers In Genesis team for speaking so boldly.

    By the way, Ken’s book One Race One Blood is also a valuable reminder that we are all truly in this together - there are no divisions beyond those we self-impose.

  • Ray Comfort of Living Waters also gave me a lesson in hope, likely without even knowing it, when I heard him say that one of the secrets to reaching people for Christ is in poking at their God-given conscious. While it’s often buried, sometimes deeply under our secular teachings, it’s always there within each of us. And if we can just help ourselves and others uncover it, the truth right and wrong is readily discerned such that we might all seek forgiveness and growth.


Lastly, to the co-founders of Pure Flix Entertainment, the movie studio behind faith-based films such as “God’s Not Dead”, “The Case for Christ”, “Do You Believe”, and the original PureFlix.com streaming video vision, thank you for the opportunity.

Russell Wolfe, your spirit was my first introduction to Pure Flix and the premature loss of your presence was mourned by many; may you rest in God’s peace.

Michael Scott and David A.R. White, you each have carried the Pure Flix torch for many years now. May you be blessed with integrity, strength, and funding to carry the mission onward for years to come. PureFlix.com remains in my prayers.

In closing, some may be wondering what’s next for myself… At the moment, only God knows and I pray that I’ll be open to following the right path at the right time. Until then, there is a lot of family time (including grandson time!) to enjoy, trails to hike, airplanes to fly, and people and causes to serve.

Thank you to all who made my PureFlix.com time a wonderful capstone.

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