Today is Valentine’s Day, a day of love! The Lord has given me a new worship album to share with the world — “YHVH  I Love You!” You can hear samples of the songs at “That is Your Name”, “YHVH I Love You”, where the entire audio recording is also available for you to download and enjoy. It’s a bit different than most of my other live albums, in that it contains more jazz improvisation than singing.

 I thought it might be interesting to share a little bit about this album: how it came about, and what it means in my heart and in my spirit.
 

TITLE of the Album: YHVH

First, the title of the album is actually the Name of our Heavenly Father: YHVH. Throughout the Old Testament, the divine Name of the LORD occurs over six thousand times, which He Himself commands us to proclaim to the world, because His Name reveals His divine character. In the King James Bible the Name of the Lord is usually rendered as “the LORD” (in small all-caps), but in the original Hebrew it’s spelled YHVH — consisting of the four Hebrew consonant letters Y, H, V and H (which in Hebrew are pronounced “Yod, Hey, Vav, Hey” and are most often pronounced “Yahveh”). But because scholars are not certain which vowels originally occurred between the four divine consonants, some call our Heavenly Father by the Name “YaH-VeH” (or Yeh-Ho-VaH’. Once the letter “J” came into the English language around the 1600’s, became known as “Je-ho-vah”, which the King James Version uses, eg “Jehovah-Jireh” (Gen 23:14), which means “The LORD our Provider.”); while others affectionately call Him “YHWH” (“YaH-WeH” or Ya-Ho-WaH). Many scholars say YHWH, but to me personally (since modern Hebrew language doesn’t have a letter “W”) I lovingly call my Heavenly Father by His Name “Yahveh.”
 

 I LOVE YOU: Love responding to Love

The essence of this album is all about YHVH’s love. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16). The Hebrew Name Yeshua (transliterated as “Jesus” in English) comes from Yah (Yahveh) and ‘shua’ (which means “salvation”). The angel said to the virgin Mary, “You shall call His Name Yeshua, for He shall save His people from their sin.” The name Yeshua means, “Yahveh is salvation” or “Yahveh saves” or “Yahveh IS salvation.” The only Savior this world has, in truth, is Yeshua (Jesus). “There is no other name in heaven given to man, by which men can be saved.” Only Yeshua can save. 

Yeshua willingly gave His life for us. “Greater love has no man than this: that he give his life for his friends”. In view of Yeshua’s amazing love as revealed in His willing death upon the cross, and in view of the Father’s amazing love in sending Yeshua (the Word of God made flesh Who dwelt among us) to the earth, and sacrificing His only Son on our behalf, so that we could be saved (shua), our response is to love Him in return! Throughout the album the Divinity of Yeshua is clearly proclaimed. At one point the Lord referred to ‘doubting Thomas’, who said he would only believe if he could himself put his hands into the Lord’s side; which Yeshua gladly allowed him to do, whereupon Thomas cried out, “My Lord and my God!” clearly revealing the depths of revelation that came into his spirit. So too, I as a one-time doubter of Yeshua, upon experiencing His reality, also cried out, “My LORD and My God!” thus declaring in faith that Yeshua is both LORD (YHVH) and GOD (the WORD of God) Who became flesh and dwelt among sinful men, in order to die for us and give us YHVH’s ‘shua’, salvation. Isaiah declared, “I am God. And besides me there is no other savior.” YHVH is our only Savior, and Yeshua is His gracious provision —our only way of salvation.  

How this album came about

The anointing

On February 2, 2016 while in Dubai, upon awakening I went to the keyboard to worship the Lord. I didn’t wash my face, only put on gym shorts and a t-shirt and sat down to worship Him. Sometimes He gives me beautiful songs of spontaneous worship, which I sing and play to Him. I usually record the audio, so that I can have it for later reference. Sometimes I record video as well. When I sense this might be the case, I usually shower and get dressed before sitting down at the keyboard to play — because once the anointing of the Lord comes upon me, I don’t want to break the prophetic flow of music in order to shower and dress to look presentable to the public, because it might distract me from bringing forth the spontaneous songs. This morning, as soon as I sat down to worship I sensed a strong drawing toward YHVH begin to churn in my spirit, so I started the audio recorder. 

 The keyboard and audio recording

I was borrowing a Yamaha PSR-910 arranger keyboard (which I don’t use often, and which auto-voices chords a little differently than most other keyboards that I use) and as I began playing what the Lord was giving me — an Ebmaj7 chord moving to a Dmin11 — the keyboard itself began playing an unusual motif that seemed to be singing out, “YHVH, I love You.” I started the audio recorder immediately and within moments was “gone” into the heavenlies. I began playing jazzy melodies and improvisations over the chord progressions, as YHVH began putting the song into my spirit and manifesting it through the keyboard.

The video recording

 My wife Cassandra (who had only just awakened) heard me playing and recognized that YHVH’s anointing was upon me. I kept worshiping the Lord while playing the keyboard, lost in the music unto Him. One of Cassandra’s ministries is to set up and prepare the video camera, which she quickly did. Then she did her best to make me look ‘presentable’ for a video recording by brushing my hair (which looked horrible after sleeping on it all night) and placing my three rings on the keyboard (in case I might stop playing long enough to put them on my fingers — which I never did — so you will see the rings all sitting on top of the keyboard throughout the entire 35-minute video). After 6 minutes Cassandra began recording the video, just after I began singing spontaneous in love to my Lord. (This is why on the YouTube video there are six minutes of jazz improvisation before my face appears on camera.)

The jazz solos

While playing the songs spontaneously on the Yamaha keyboard, I chose solo instruments including guitars, organs, pianos, flutes, saxophones, trumpets, and synthesizers, to express my love for YHVH and Yeshua. I sang from my heart, songs that I’d never sung before. It was all spontaneous and never rehearsed in any way. The chord progressions were often dynamic and changing along the way. The motif continued repeatedly throughout the 35-minute song, concluding at the end of the song in similar fashion to the beginning.

My Testimony and Prayer of Dedication

Then near the end of the live recording I share a bit of my personal testimony about how, as an atheist, I first came to accept Yeshua as my Lord and Savior (“But to as many as receive Him, He gives power and authority to become children of God!” John 1:12). Then I lead a prayer to  accept Yeshua, which the listener can also pray to Him, to give their life to YHVH.