Brand HistoryMay 22, 20264 min read

How Precious Moments Got Its Name: The Story of Johnathan & David

By the early 1970s, Sam Butcher and Bill Biel had found their rhythm. Two men, opposite in temperament but perfectly matched in talent and purpose — Sam the illustrator, Bill the designer — working side by side at Child Evangelism Fellowship in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Their friendship had already survived more separations and reunions than most partnerships could have withstood. God, it seemed, kept putting them back in the same room.

That room was about to become too small.

A Company Named for Friendship

On an ordinary evening, Sam and Bill were watching a film together when a simple idea took root: visual aids for Christian teaching. Not just the flannel graph backgrounds and buttons they'd been creating, but something more. A commercial art ministry of their own. A way to reach people with art and faith at the same time, on their own terms.

By 1974, that idea had become a company. Jonathan & David, Inc. was officially founded — named for one of the most celebrated friendships in all of Scripture, the bond between Prince Jonathan and David. A friendship defined by loyalty, sacrifice, and love that asked nothing in return. To Sam and Bill, the name needed no explaining. It said everything about who they were to each other.

"Because of our close friendship, we named our company Jonathan & David, after the beautiful Biblical friends of David and Prince Jonathan. We fit perfectly together — not only as close friends, but as a successful working team. I was the illustrator and Bill, the designer." — Sam Butcher

Bill, characteristically, added the practical footnote: "Sam had a left hand and I had a right hand; our talents overlapped. Sam refused to do the bookkeeping so I had to do it."

By 1975, Jonathan & David was creating buttons and Bible flannel graph backgrounds for Sunday schools and taking on freelance commercial work, their clients mostly local. It was humble, faithful work — the kind that gets done quietly, without fanfare, by people who believe they're exactly where they're supposed to be.

Then an invitation arrived that would change everything.

The Convention That Changed Everything

A company called Mott Media asked Sam and Bill to attend the upcoming Christian Booksellers Convention in Anaheim, California — and offered them their own booth. The partners had reservations at first. They didn't want to go. That changed when they heard they would have their own space to present their work.

Sam was nervous. He didn't believe anyone beyond his closest circle would respond the way Bill seemed certain they would. Bill, who had heard these doubts before, reminded his partner plainly: "Look, Sam — before we got here you were the one so convinced the Lord had opened this door for us, and now that we're here you don't believe it! Well, I happen to still believe that God brought us here and He will take care of us. So, quit complaining. We still have a lot of work to do."

o prepare for the convention, Sam put together something he had been creating privately for years — greeting cards featuring children with the distinctive teardrop-shaped eyes that had become his signature. He drew them for friends and family, for people going through difficult times, as his personal and quiet way of saying I'm here if you need me.

Bill looked at the cards and gave them a name.

Precious Moments.

"And that's how it all began," Sam said.

Faith Over Finances

The response at that first convention exceeded anything either man had dared to hope for. On day one, nothing happened. So Sam and Bill began handing out buttons they'd made. Word spread. Their booth became, as Sam later described it, a beehive of activity. By the end of the convention, they had written around $10,000 worth of orders. People from neighboring booths came over just to help write them all down.

That night they celebrated with pizza — and then realized, practically speaking, they had no idea how they were going to pay for any of it.

They visited a bank. They were turned down. They approached a Christian Businessmen's Association, who wished them well and offered to pray. Finally, Sam and Bill did what they had always done: they gave it to God.

The bills were paid. Every one of them. One angel took the shape of a building owner who, hearing that Sam and Bill only had $43 to their name, dropped their monthly rent from $300 to $40 — and told them to let him know when business improved. Another year, with the soles of Sam's shoes literally tied on with string, they painted Christmas scenes on store windows and garage doors to keep their families fed. They made all the Christmas gifts that year themselves.

"The Lord always met our needs and at very crucial moments. Not always our wants — but He did meet our needs." — Bill Biel

The greeting cards were the beginning. Sam and Bill knew the children with the teardrop eyes were meant for more. But getting them there would take one more miracle — in the form of a man they hadn't yet met, who happened to stop at a gift show in Los Angeles one afternoon and saw something that changed him on the spot.