No matter what version you read it out of, Proverbs 19:21 sums up 2011, and really the last 7 years of my life quite well.

Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the LORD’s purpose that prevails.

You can make many plans, but the LORD’s purpose will prevail.

We humans keep brainstorming options and plans, but God’s purpose prevails.

In the beginning of 2011 I was rolling along, growing Holy Cow’s impact and reach…doing what I do. During the year a few churches asked me to join their staff, but we were comfortable and felt good doing what we were doing. We weren’t moving, we weren’t going on staff. We knew where we were headed.

“many are your plans”

Then one of the churches we worked with asked me to increase my role there. I eagerly accepted the new role but told them I’d do it in Michigan.

“many are your plans”

Yep, as I wrote about, that translated into us moving down there. But we were still going to be on contract, our workload would increase but not much else other than location and more on-site involvement. It was all still really Holy Cow. I wasn’t coming on full time, I wouldn’t have office hours, steady as she goes.

“many are your plans”

On January 2 I will begin leading the marketing and media team of Victory World Church.

That’s kinda scary and most certainly a bit uncomfortable. For the last 7 years I came and went as I pleased. I set my own hours, I did my own thing. I answered to no one. But in those restless moments, when I start to get anxious I remember the rest, and greatest part of the verse:

“the Lord’s purpose prevails”

They are giving me a lot of room and flexibility to continue to speak and consult and I will continue to direct and champion Holy Cow Creative, but in 2012 I will begin leading this group at this amazing church.

8 years ago I wanted to be creative director at my church of not quite 1000 people. That door closed, Holy Cow was born. I thought I had landed. I thought that desire was gone, door closed and locked. But I am now the Experience Pastor at a church of 10,000.

See, what it doesn’t say, and you just end up figuring it out, is that not only does the Lord’s purpose prevail but it is MUCH MUCH better than what you’d ever dream. The coolest part of all of this is that none of it was on my radar, I didn’t orchestrate it. God opened the door and pulled me through.

This year I had the chance to get an early galley of Len Sweet’s I Am a Follower in order to consider writing an endorsement (which I gladly did). Within it held my new resolution for 2011 and every year after it: Follow Christ and let Him lead.

As in, forget your plans. Forget walking in one direction and asking God to come find you and help you but in walking beside the Savior and following His path.

So go ahead and make your resolution, setup your 5 year plan, it is a good start. But know that if you let God lead, those plans will fade into something much more amazing.

What has God surprised you with in 2011?
What doors are you seeing opened as He leads you into 2012?

Thank you for not dumping me at the altar as I licked my lips ready for you to be my bride.

Thank you for holding me back so I wouldn’t tell our pastor to get on with it.

Thank you for making me laugh and allowing me the privilege of bringing laughter to your life.

Thank you for never giving up on the plans that God created for us. When this picture was taken we had no idea the hell our life was about to go through. But we also didn’t know just how much our God loves us. I truly believe that while I wouldn’t wish that dark valley on anyone, it has made us stronger and his given our marriage the character it has needed to get us to the happiness we now experience. You may quite possibly be my exact opposite, and I am grateful that God has shown me just how beautiful that is.

Most of you weren’t at the wedding (we only invited 70, if that). So here are a couple of highlights:

We didn’t make everyone eat out of the same dry cake. Instead each table had its own cake, each a different flavor. We didn’t do dancing (because I’m sure Carrie would’ve divorced me on the spot if she saw me dance) so we encouraged people to get up and try their neighbors cake too. Loads of fun.

Our party favor was a CD mix of some of our favorite songs.

My favorite picture.

And one last one because he’s just so darned cute. Yep, that’s Ty.

If you follow the twitter feed you know that I’m in Atlanta usually once a month working with a great church down there, Victory World Church.

You may have also seen some chatter about a move.

Well, through a course of events that could only be orchestrated by God (and if you want the whole story give me a shout, it’s incredible) a conversation came up with them about increasing my role there.

Over the past few months Carrie and I have met with them, talked it through, prayed about it, and sought wise council of expanding our contract by serving as the Experience Pastor at Victory World Church.

And in January (tentatively 1/11/12) we will move to Atlanta.

We are really excited about what this means for us personally and professionally as well as what it will mean for Holy Cow Creative. We have really fallen in love with the people at Victory. The staff and leadership became quick friends. Professionally and for Holy Cow we are stretching our tent and thinking big.

This allows for an even greater impact on the Church as well as allowing me to bring more talent to Holy Cow. I will continue as owner (because I’m not really selling the biz) and Creative Director of Holy Cow. I will continue to consult and speak (and excited to fly out of a major hub) and am working a number of projects that I’m really excited about as well.

So, much will stay the same. Much will be added. I serve an amazing God and am so very thankful for His favor on us.

I think it is important to point out that I didn’t plan this. This isn’t happening because I’m so awesome. 6 months ago, I wouldn’t have imagined this opportunity. This isn’t a door that I knocked on. This is a reflection of what happens when we stop trying to figure it all out and start first with following Christ and letting Him lead.

God has an amazing thing in store for you too, sometimes you just might have to get out of the way and stop trying to force it.

Carrie’s thoughts on the move >>

“are you building a business or creating a job for yourself”

I see a lot of people who call themselves business owners but as Bruce points out what they’ve really done is create a job for themselves. They don’t own it, it owns them.

I don’t just want a job.

I own a business.

But I don’t want to just own a business.

I’ve lately realized that those aren’t my only choices. I didn’t start Holy Cow so that I could have a large agency, though we’ve certainly been blessed with growth, I started Holy Cow to bring change to the way the church communicates, to help make the bride of Christ beautiful.

You can create a job, you can build a business or you can create a movement and platform. And that’s my goal with Holy Cow. To create a platform, a movement, focused on ministry. I call that Holy Cow, and the IRS sees it as business. But it’s not about the business, I could sell it today and little would change.

So no, I’m not selling Holy Cow, but I am looking at it less and less as a business. So go ahead and buy it. I’m not holding on to it as tightly. In fact I’m currently working on some things that aren’t Holy Cow and certainly not all about Michael Buckingham, but that will serve as a platform to build a movement towards greater communication within the church.

*That said, if Google decides to buy Holy Cow! along with Yahoo! I’ll take those millions and continue to build a movement of the church once again being the most creative place on the planet. Because the God we serve poured his creativity in us and as the bride of Christ we must be beautiful. Oh, and I’ll buy a jet.

What are you building?

the best parts of a conference aren’t the speakers.
(unless maybe if it’s an online only conference)

It’s all about the people and relationships. But sometimes you need an icebreaker.

Sometimes you need a laugh.

And sometimes you just need to punk a creative.

So….I’ve created the Holy Cow! I’ve Been Punked sheet for you to print out, cut out and enjoy! Slap these babies on your unsuspecting creatives back and let the conference begin!

These are also great for your next creative meeting, your next general council…but not a prayer meeting. [tape sold seperately]

Let the wild rumpus start. Roar! (which means download by clicking below)

Update: Let’s make this interesting, have some fun with these, stick it to your favorite creative, then take a pic and post it here. On Monday I’ll pick one for a free holy cow shirt.

As I was hanging out at the Dynamic Church conference, I was reminded that I hadn’t written in awhile. I haven’t made space for it, May has been a very full and exciting month.

Since I have a few days before I get on a plane again, thought I’d reflect on the month so far.

First up was Cultivate

Here I was reminded that while I am passionate about helping the church communicate in a way that reflects the greatness of the message, it’s not the most important thing.

The most important thing are people. Shelene was right when she said “we are overfed and underconcerned” and “we want for nothing and say we are broke”.

It is easy for me to get so focused on the specific vision God has given me, that I lose sight of all else.

I’ve said it before, and while it was an honor to share the stage again with Mark Horvath, it was better hanging out with Mark and so many others. The best part of conferences aren’t speeches and ideas, the best part are relationships.

Then The Whiteboards Sessions

The first thing I got from this was a new app, AudioNote, so cool. It allows you to take notes, record the speaker and it time stamps as you type. Cool.

The theme of this was “one thing”. The one thing I’m going to focus on from this is not only defining reality but revealing possibility.

Part of what I do with Holy Cow is to see what’s missing, what’s not working well, etc. and then bring solutions. I want to increase my sight to also see greatness in things. To see the possibility in people.

Thanks to Jason Young for letting me be a part and to help bring some of the pieces together for the event.

Then Dynamic Church

I didn’t get to take as much in here as I had two different sessions to teach, but what I did grab ahold of was really gorgeous. Jenni Catron said “to who much is given – they must give much away”.

We are in a really exciting season. I am so grateful for the blessings God is giving and my prayer is that I find and seek opportunities to give them away.

And of course it’s always great to spend time with my bro Matt Knisely.

Then Catalyst

Captain Scotty Smiley’s story was so emotional, really wrecked me.

Of course Andy Stanley brought it, my big take away from him “exploit your strengths”. I’ve tried, for too long, to do it all. This season that we’re in requires me to let go of things and enable others to live within their calling. And sometimes it’s about seasons. I’m about to let go of something that I really held in high regard for a long time, since even before Holy Cow. But the time has come to let it go and get out of the way.

Catalyst Dallas also proves that you don’t have to be huge to be amazing. It was held at Bent Tree, and while a great church, by no means as big as Atlanta’s Gwinnett Center. But it was every bit as impacting. In fact, I’d even say I liked the atmosphere better. So don’t let being smaller stop you from achieving bigger.

Met a lot of great people, got to hang out with the gang from The Oaks, see my friend Stephen Proctor…again, all about people.

Mixed in there where some exciting meetings with some churches

I love it when things happen and I’ve not orchestrated any of it. Don’t want to say much but let’s just say it’s an exciting time at Holy Cow, and I also have a few opportunities that may require a move (and no, not internationally as the image my hint at).

And then finally home

I am so blessed to have such a supportive and loving wife. And for any of you out there that just though ‘must be nice’, know that our marriage barely made it off the ground. Our first year of marriage was almost our last. God won, and I’m so grateful he was patient and loving with us. Thanks for sticking in there Carrie.

Next up: Creative Missions

I head out in a few days to work with a group of small churches in Albany that have big hearts and big needs. There’s a whole team of talented artists, technicians, you name it that are going to help these churches communicate with greatness. A big shout out to Cleve Persinger for steering this boat.

Oh, and in case I’ve not told you John Jay Wilson really is the bomb.

When I teach my creativity/brainstorming/ideation workshops one of the things I talk about is becoming a sponge, creating habits of always taking in inspiration. Sometimes you need to squeeze that sponge for the next great idea. Sometimes, as Todd Henry at Accidental Creative talks about, you simply need to be creating.

So I’ll leave the insightful message up to you, or you can just download and have a good laugh. That’s good too.

download, print, share...just don't change.

When Nathan asked for a set of the stamps I used as a part of my “Jesus Hates Papyrus” talk because they use them as part of their creative team, I had to know how they were using them. Thanks Nathan for sharing. -MB

Ever since the Echo Conference it seems like the Jesus Hates Papyrus phenomenon has taken our creative team by storm. Because it was brought to our attention, our tendency to stay within our comfort zone has started to die off and our services are becoming better.

Anyone who is involved in creative meetings knows that sometimes they can get bogged down, especially if you are like me and have a hard time not seeing your idea as yourself and fighting each battle to death. One thing that has really helped this predisposition in our meetings is the “Jesus thinks this is swell!” stamp. If for no other reason it has given us a bit of an ice-breaker that helps us remember who we are doing all our work for.

The stamp adorns everything from graphics to drama scripts to video storyboards to people. It is just a unique idea that helps to break the tension between our creative individuals and keeps us all batting for the same team. I would highly recommend acquiring one along with a “Jesus doesn’t like this” stamp. They are a fun tool that will increase your creative productivity!

ABOUT NATHAN: Born in Colorado and raised in South Dakota, he has been working in the church most of his life. Currently am employed as the Assistant Creative Arts Director at Countryside Church in Spearfish, SD. Functioning as the vessel between the technical and the creative, he’s the guy that makes it come together, a young man trying to creatively communicate the word of God.

I was blessed last month when Matt Knisely connected me to Jerry Miner of Water Missions International. Blessed not just because the project was a blast and I love the final results of the branding work, but because Jerry is oozing vision.

Jerry’s vision:

giving 100 communities – 250,000 people the gift of safe water – in 10 weeks – $10 at a time.

I remember as Jerry told me that, it caused me to pause. That means that 250,000 people are drinking water that will likely kill them. Moms, dads, their kids don’t have some as simple as safe water.

And we can change that with $10.

$10. We can all give at least $10, we can all find 10 of our friends to give $10 who can then find 10 more.

And that $10 gives 1 person safe water….if I find 10 people who find 10 people THAT’S 100 PEOPLE WITH SAFE WATER!

Let’s do this. I could talk about how we could give up a Mocha Frappe Latteda, but it’s $10. You can do this, we can do this. So grab your phone text WMI to 85944 and spread the word. Then tune into giftsofwater.com as they will be broadcasting these communities as they receive the gift of water that you’ve given to them.

Who’s with me?

We all say we have it, and we probably do…for the most part. But I’m reminded of the story of the fishermen as Christ said follow me. Following Christ is one thing, maybe the easy thing, but leaving everything you have to follow him. Wow.

I hope I’d have that kind of faith, but I’m not sure I would. It took being let go at the design firm for me to really embrace what God had been stirring in me to do and to start Holy Cow!

But then there’s Katie.

God stirred, said go and she’s going! She may not know exactly where, but she does know who’s navigating, and that’s inspiring. Katie helped get a church started a bit less than two years ago, she was comfortable, but in her own words:

All the while, I would admire and be slightly envious of those who had the courage to live their God-given dreams, to go when He said go, who fully and completely trusted God with their lives. I would think to myself, “someday, I’m going to live that way…someday.”

So “someday” came a few months ago when she stepped out of “easy” and into the unknown waters of God and resigned from the church. One month ago she packed her car and headed to Nashville.

She doesn’t know what’s next. She doesn’t know exactly what God has planned. And she has found peace in that, and I’ve found beauty in that. Katie is a remarkable woman, keep an eye on her and let her story inspire you as it has me.

What does your someday hold?