Todd Hertz, a critic for CT Movies, is also a self-professed TV geek. But he'd pretty much avoided TBN -- the Trinity Broadcasting Network -- till a couple months ago, when, as an experiment, he watched a week of its prime-time programming just to get a better feel for what the network was all about.

"All I knew," Todd wrote recently at ThinkChristian, "was what I’d read, heard or glimpsed while channel surfing—headlines about mixing money and ministry, a reputation for being cheesy, a talk-show set with golden thrones, and some woman with big pink hair."

But Todd notes that when his week-long experiment ended, "Yes, I’d seen some cheesy stuff. I’d listened to pastors who certainly mixed money and ministry. But I’ll admit that I was pleasantly surprised by some programs" -- including Precious Memories with Bill Gaither. Kingdom Connection, and Ancient Secrets of the Bible.

Read more of Todd's observations about the network in his two-part series.