This Is My Beloved Friend
YouTube Audio
YouTube Audio
David Barnes Salmon Arm, British Columbia June 22, 2025
words spoken in Sunday service @ Edenvale Emissary Community, Abbotsford, B.C.
The air is clear here at Edenvale—clean and clear and sweet. I've been reminded of a verse from Rumi, as I walk around these grounds: “Things good and generous take form in me, and the air is clear.” Let it rain! Rain washes the air clean and clear and pure. I've been here at Edenvale on many occasions over the past 50 years. The air has been washed clear and clean of old ghosts. It's beautiful.
Yesterday during the AGM business meeting, Carol Robertson read a statement that relates to acknowledging the unceded land of the Stó:lō people—First Nations. I want to kind of “riff” off that a bit, and make a statement, with great respect for the Original People who have been here for ages and ages.
We are part of the Original People, by the way—we have been here since the beginning. We have our elders; we have our ancestors; we have our culture, our language, our legacy, our many generations. We have our teachers and our holy people. I want to read something that I wrote this morning, that takes off on that reference to “unceded land”.
“O what glory fills thy temple … in this place our holy home.”
Here is what I wrote: “I would like to begin by acknowledging that we are here at Edenvale, at Sunrise Ranch, and gathered in various locations around the world, and we stand on Holy Ground—this unceded new and promised land, provided by the Lord our God for the sole use and wise stewardship of this Transcendent Nation that we are, now gathered here.”
“The earth is the LORD’s, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.” Unceded by the LORD and by His people—never turned over to a foreign government, or presumptuous human nature authority. We are here to acknowledge that—and to welcome all people into this Transcendent Nation that we have come to know: the language, the culture, the traditions, the teachings, the elders, the ancestors, the prophets and the priests, and the location where we are in this solar system, part of the living body of the sun and the cosmos.
Things good and generous take form in me, and the air is clear
And yet, if the air is clear, how could it be that we are in the midst of this—what did David call it? so beautiful those words: “a full-scale spiritual downpour.” I love these words. Where did they originate? They originated in Divine Being, coming through cosmic mind, into the human mind of a man that we know: David Karchere. They didn't originate in a human being separate from Divine Being and Divine Mind. There is connection all the way through. A full-scale spiritual downpour. I know that Hugh Duff knows—he's been in the midst of it for years and years and years. Beautiful. Fire and rain. Love and truth raining down, transforming, hitting the ground of my being, your being. We know this.
We know this when it hits the ground. We know that when we have fire and we have rain, there's a mist that begins to rise up out of the ground of being, and this is what is experienced when we are in the midst is this clarity that is present. There is a Cloud of Glory that forms, because of this spiritual downpour that has been grounded in the being of my living, of your living, and it begins to rise, and fill the air around us. And through this Cloud of Glory we begin to see who is with us. We begin to see each other in a brand new way, through this clarity that comes. And inside of the Cloud, there is a Design of Being that we begin to become familiar with. It's called the Light that Glows—the Design of Being. And within it there is a Fire, a purpose and the power to fulfill that purpose. And we see each other within this Cloud, this Fire and this Light—and it is impossible to mistake who is present here, with me, with you, in this place. And we discover the reality of friendship, within this Cloud of Glory.
It begins to become so clear and so apparent, and I look, you look, and I say, “This is my Beloved Friend.” We are friends within this Cloud of Glory, and in this Light and in this Fire. This is my Beloved Friend—unashamed to acknowledge and recognize the Eternal Being that I'm with. This is my Beloved Friend.
In this case, reading this “Pulse of Spirit”, this marvelous piece titled, “Let It Rain”— this is my Beloved Friend, David Karchere, [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/let-it-rain.html] who I know in this human form as this man named David. But now I know him at the level of Eternal Being, and that is unmistakable. Hugh or Barb, Keahi, Marilyn, everybody. Everybody may not know it, but I can know it, if that fire and that rain has thoroughly drenched my soul, and transformed. Baptism by fire. Baptism by water. Everything made new.
And this is happening. And that's why the air is clear here, over these days that we've spent at Edenvale. People are living in this way. And there's more to come. It's just a beginning. It's a new day, as Marilyn Manderson said. It's a new era. Something quite, quite new is emerging. And this piece in Pulse of Spirit, “Let It Rain”, speaks to that. We are in the midst of a full-scale spiritual downpour. And it's wonderful to be fully immersed in this fire and in this rain.
