1984 - This song started out as a catchy riff I started playing while Mark Crafford and I were jamming one day. There was a song I had taught to our fellowship called He Is Alive which I learned from Shannon during the IYM missions program. Mark Crafford came up with words for the first verse to go with my riff somewhat similar to that song. I wrote the chorus and subsequent verses. I later took the same riff and wrote a different song called The Eyes of Jesus in 1995. Anyway, He Lives never really caught on as a worship song, but we used to play it during transition times like during an alter call, or after the service when the congregation was clearing out. I remember Dave Hoffman heard us playing it one time and commented that he really liked it.
In those days we never used overheads for the worship. If people didn’t know the lyrics by the 3rd or 4th time, I would stop playing the song. I also was careful not to make songs too “wordy”. You can see how far from that philosophy the worship songs have come today. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing or a good thing; just an observation. Back then I rarely made a song list either. I wanted the worship to be directed by the Holy Spirit site on scene. Some band members really hated that- they said “he shoots from the hip!” The way I saw it was, we should all know all of the songs and be ready to play any one of them at any time. Of course this idea was flawed in that it caused us to limit the number of new songs we learned and played. I did follow a formula that I learned from the Anaheim Vineyard though. Start with a ‘call to worship’, progress to ‘praise and thanksgiving’, and transition to ‘direct worship’ at the point of engagement. Not to put God in a box or anything, but in my experience this was a very powerful progression of worship and led to awesome face to face time with Jesus! Here’s the song:
HE LIVES
Words & music by Reggie Michaud & Mark Crafford © 1984
He lives He lives He certainly lives
He gives He gives abundantly gives
He loves He loves, forever He loves
He lives He lives He certainly lives
And His name is Lord,
And His name is Jehova
And His name is Jesus Christ,
Son of God and author of life
You live You live You certainly live
You give You give abundantly give
You love You love, forever You love
You live You live You certainly live
And Your name is Lord,
And Your name is Jehova
And Your name is Jesus Christ,
Son of God and author of life