Fresh-faced, effervescent, looking like the adolescent he actually was, Jay bounced into the Study.
      For some reason, he always found himself stopping in mid-stride to wonder at the surroundings of this unusual corner of Home. Today was no exception: for several Minutes he did this again, a process not interrupted by the quiet “Hello, Jay” that reached his ears from the other side of the Desk. As usual, yet ever so very unusual, the Boy’s eyes took in an incredible scene: the more he tried to view the scene objectively, the more the impression was of a small, cozy retreat from the world, having a lively, cheerful fire in the fireplace to the right, a green-shaded desk lamp, a large wooden desk carefully fitted with a glass top, a few shelves of nostalgically-intriguing-looking books, comfortable chairs surrounding that, deep green carpeting, lighting that was subdued yet ample for any purpose … yet the more he studied it, the more intense grew his impression that this was merely a superficial appearance. He de-intensified his “eye” gaze, and he wasn’t disappointed: the objective impression didn’t actually disappear — instead, it deepened and “fleshed itself out” with a subjective impression of vastness, of Light, of birds singing in trees, of sunshine filtering through the leaves, leaving dappled impressions of itself around the edges of his consciousness.
      Still standing there in mid-stride, the Boy closed his eyes and savored the atmosphere for two or three Minutes. Finally, having had enough, he finished the stride much more peacefully than he had begun it, and two or three more as well, which brought him to one of the chairs. He sat down. Only then did he speak: “Hi, Dad. As always, Your Study is a balm to my soul.” He breathed out in a long sigh, obviously relaxing still more.
      “It works.” Dad was obviously as relaxed as his Son — in no hurry to force anything to happen at any particular time. “At least partly,” He added after several seconds’ rumination.
      “I suppose,” Jay began, “that that’s as good a place to start as any. Why does it work so well — perfectly, for You — here, but not elsewhere, and why doesn’t it work as well for anyone else, including me?”
      Dad leaned back in His chair and placed the tips of His fingers together. “Surely you know the Answer to that.”
      “Yep. And You know my answer to that Answer.” Jay grinned faintly but impishly.
      Dad chuckled. “Okay, so your young heart is burning up with all the nineteen squillion types of hell that everyone seems to be feeling. Right?”
      “Of course. And that isn’t all.”
      At that moment a blast of sound invaded the peace of the Study. It seemed to consist of amateurish choral singing accompanied by even more amateurishly-played harps. In a completely conversational voice that somehow rang throughout the Study, Dad said, “Silence, please.” Obviously the performers hadn’t heard it, because the sound continued. Without raising his voice an iota, Dad repeated, “Silence, please.” Yet this time the power of the words shook the fireplace, the desk, the Boy’s chair, the branches dappling the sunlight in his mind, and even the foundations of the Home itself. This time the effect was immediate.
      To the Boy, Dad explained, “You’d think that, after all the extra explanations I’ve given them, the fundie Christians would finally get the idea that our Home is not merely streets populated by winged harp players whose sole duty is to see how much they can annoy a couple of peace-loving souls trying to hold a simple conversation, even if it is all done up handsomely in gold.” He laughed gently for a moment, then continued, “Their obsession with gold continues to impress Me. Talk about a worthless chemical element! Oh, it has a few uses, of course — but hardly anything to obsess over.”
      “And that points up the main reason I requested this talk with You. How many times have I tried to go to them in person to tell them that very thing?”
      “Two hundred ninety-seven.”
      “And I’ve failed thus far —”
      “Peace, Jay.” Dad cut the Son off kindly but with Peace and Authority. “Obviously it’s time to try to remind you of a few basics. Let’s try to put this into perspective for a moment, OK?”
      Jay looked at his Father with deep despair in his young eyes, then nodded after a moment.
      “First, you were about to remonstrate with Me for sending so young a son, right?”
      Jay nodded again.
      Dad leaned forward over His Desk. “Look, Kid, you’re only seventeen. Yet you have still pulled off 297 missions for Me already, yes?”
      “If You say so, Dad — I haven’t kept count.”
      “I have, so 297 it is. Do you realize you’re by far the youngest one we’ve ever sent as Messiah? — that the next youngest was twice your age, or 34? — That no other Messiah has ever made it even to the three digits — to the ‘century mark’ — before quitting?”
      Jay was weeping into one hand; Dad handed him a few tissues. “No, I’ve never seen those numbers.”
      “Of course not — you’ve been too busy in the Nether Marches ever to have seen a report. Do you remember the discussion we had on your fourteenth birthday, when you first volunteered to go?”
      “No …”
      “Yes, I realize you could pull it up from your memory, but right now I’d rather spare you the energy. You told Me in no uncertain terms that you loved Me and My Creation. You wanted to go forth and try to save it in the name of Truth. I was a bit doubtful at first that at a mere fourteen Years old you could do much more than My adult offspring. By your fifteenth birthday, you had proved your point — in spades. Do you remember the special ceremony we held on the day you turned fifteen?
      “Yes, I can see that you do — yet a refresher is surely in order. Jay, you were the first to assume the mantle, and the Name, of My Love. Our ceremony made that ‘official’ as, on that day, you went into mission #100.
      “Now, the first 99 missions were already remarkable for their fruitfulness — on #1 you brought ten souls Home, which was two-thirds again the previous record. From #99, you brought 57 Home. From #100, you brought home 223. Now, Jay, I don’t really mean to dwell on dry numbers all afternoon here, but your 297th mission has certainly shown the value of what you’ve been doing. Over 37,500 souls have found their way home since your last Return. Not to mention the fact that record numbers of these are choosing to stay around there and help out. You see, your embodiment of My Love has proven rather infectious.”
      With a pale face and shaking hands, Jay sat there pondering what Dad had just told him. From my shortest actual Service time, my call to that many has actually paid off?
      “Obviously, your youthful intensities have been providing a very strong impetus,” Dad went on after a time. “This is why I want to offer you a Permanent Calling.”
      “Now, I’ve heard that term somewhere before,” Jay commented.
      “And it’s always been a mystery to you.”
      “Yes …”
      “Know, then, that this is indeed one of My Great Mysteries. Until they’re ready, no one can even seriously investigate the question. You have been ready for several Years now — just too busy to let Me catch up to you with it. Prepare for Immediate Initiation.”
      Instantly Jay’s mind went into Overdrive. Whenever Dad offered anyone Instant Initiation, it always meant high drama — if the Initiate could spawn the appropriate responses. He recalled how, in the Nether Marches, he would often deliver one or other of Dad’s Instant Initiations out there himself — though obviously only the Initiate would immediately apprehend the meaning of the event, let alone anything of its Truth or High Union. He reflected briefly on how this was all the more true because of the fact that the Initiate was adding his unit-force to the greater Group Force which formed the True Initiate, and that his unit understanding was expanded by sharing of the Original Experience which Dad Himself had had uncounted cycles previously. But no time to think of all of that now — Dad was continuing.
      “You have been wondering how to arrange Mission #298. We will approach the solution of that question simultaneously. Please state your doubts.”
      Instantly Jay’s answer was ready; instantly he started delivering it. “In some ways, humanity has descended even further into banality, and often worse. Outwardly, life has become institutionally blind — and blindly institutional.
      “It’s the Age of Technology. I could not appear as I actually AM anywhere without it becoming a media circus and instant degeneration into demands for phenomena. There is also the question of where to appear: the world is essentially a body covered with massive injuries and infections to the point where any one of me is not likely to be useful enough. Any group I appear among would be surrounded by hundreds of others who would feel slighted, or worse. Therefore, appearance seems contraindicated.
      “Yet my vaunted intuition keeps trying to persuade me that action — now — may well be the key to winning my entire share of the souls at risk.”
      “Well put — tidy and concise,” Dad commented. “What can you still reap from #297?”
      “As they reckon time, it’s been nearly the 2000 years many of them seem to expect. So they’re — expecting — me …” Jay’s voice broke temporarily with the overwhelming emotion of the moment. “Now, Dad, I know that You have no limits — but, as my Dad right here, right now, I tend to trust Your grammar. #297 is the only mission where You refer to ‘over’ some number of saved souls, and to the fact that they ‘have returned’ instead of simply ‘returned.’ This tells me the field is still ripe and the harvest still proceeding.”
      “Excellent!” exclaimed Dad. “So what does that do for your appearance problem?”
      Jay thought furiously. Moments later, an idea began to form. Long before he had finished this process, Dad interrupted by rising from his chair, walking around the desk with glowing hands, placing them on Jay’s head and intoning: “I give of Myself to you in Permanent Calling to the Most High.”
      Ah! Would that I could transmit anything of the transcendent Glory that Jay felt at that instant! — the profound Humility, which is after all neither more nor less than the measure of the depth of our understanding of our Oneness with All Things, that lit up his Heart in eternal gratitude! Shortly it was over; Jay resumed his seat, as did Dad, tears flowing down both of their cheeks. Now there were tissues in Dad’s hand as well; Jay used his to good advantage.
      Jay realized, as his recently deliciously-tortured mind settled down again, that the question that had prepared the way for his startlingly Instant Initiation was still hanging fire. At this point, something of the true value of Dad’s gift to him in the Initiation became apparent: the idea which had begun to form now resurfaced in his mind with a new clarity and a strangely different impact.
      Initially the idea had sprung out of the notion of using some of those coming Home to help him escape the problem of appearances. But with that single sentence, Dad had given him a tool of incomparable power which enabled him to recast the thought. “Appearances” simply dropped out of the picture; “Far greater accessibility to all people” replaced it. Jay marveled at the subtle redefinition that had occurred, plus its amazing power. He meditated for several Minutes before saying anything further.
      “So all I have to do …” he continued haltingly after his long pause, “is to get close enough to earth to fertilize the fields to some degree … and then sit there … and just BE.” He paused some more, thinking still. “Say, get down to a good level up from their physical plane where I need but stand and smile at them … and they’re fertilized, inside first and then out. There sure will be a lot of miserable teen-agers for a while — not to mention their newly-reawakened parents. But I love it. It’s far less work for me, they don’t get to kill me in my own body … that should do marvelous things for my usefulness this time! … That way those who are Readiest will get the clearest view of me; their opposites won’t stand a chance until they get their own acts together, which sooner or later they will do if only out of curiosity to find out what’s been happening to their slightly more advanced buddies. Oh, it will create quite a stir.”
      At that moment Dad fixed his eyes lovingly on Jay, but Jay was still too preoccupied to feel them. “And the perfect genius of all of this is that they’ll think they’re doing it all — and then they’ll be absolutely amazed to wake up one fine morning with me smiling into their faces, and then they’ll realize that, despite all, they are absolutely right! MARvelous material for unification of souls.” At this point Jay felt Dad’s gaze, looked up with a beautiful smile, and said, “Thanks, Dad!”
      “Not so fast, Son. The thinking you just were doing was your own.”
      “As if that doesn’t translate directly into Your own too!” The boy-impishness was definitely back.
      “Touché — partly.” Dad smiled gravely. “Please remember that you’re representing only half of Me.”
      Understanding exploded in Jay’s mind. “Ah — You’re right. I had forgotten that,” Jay said softly. “How can I represent all of You?”
      “By becoming Me, as your elder siblings have done. Peace, youth; the time for that is, in your case, still far off. You are needed urgently to Balance the Scales, to represent Light in what has become too emphatically a cesspool of Darkness.”
      Jay thought that over somberly for a moment, then looked at Dad, brightened up, and smiled. “Yeah, I guess so. After all, it isn’t everyone who is able to represent even half of You, let alone that half.”
      “It’s not for want of invitation. Please remember the amateur musicians I had to shut up a few Minutes ago, who are now anxiously listening to every word we’re saying. Understand that they too have heard it — in fact, they’re probably feeling pretty sheepish right now for their failure to understand it adequately, never mind that it had gotten to their ears so garbled that not even I could understand it aright, were it not for the fact that I had issued it in the first place!”
      Jay was silent for a time. “Is Moe still alive?”
      “Other than a select few whom we all know too well, who is not?”
      “But — I mean — here. With us here at Home, as a separate being.”
      “Are you still ‘alive,’ Jay? Please remember that Moe is considerably younger than you are. He’s not quite twelve.”
      After musing for another few moments, Jay asked, “Where’s Mom? She seems to have been a bit scarce lately.”
      “Sitting right here talking to you!” Jay, startled for an instant, looked up at the suddenly female voice — coming from the familiar Face in its other rôle. It was however only for an instant, as he realized the true answer to his original question: this conversation had been carried on with his Father/Mother as One, not as either of them separately. “Even after all the preaching and teaching, it still catches me a bit off guard,” he observed with a wry grin.
      “No more you than Me,” replied Dad/Mom. “I too am still getting used to the way I AM — never mind all the Years of beaching, bleaching and pleaching! Come, the time grows short; let us have one Hug before it’s Time …”
      Jay walked around the Desk and was received in warm embrace. For two or three Minutes it went on — long enough by far for Jay and Dad/Mom to spend an Infinity as Mom/Dad/Jay — and yet the Time came when Jay had to move out on his own again. Indeed it was Time and to spare: fortunate it was indeed that this time there would be no Dedicated Bodily Birth.
      As seemed to happen increasingly of late, Jay waved to his Parent/s; as one and yet as two They waved back.
      As they did so, Existence Itself seemed to join in the waving — now seen to be more of a wavering than a waving. The usual headlong rush, the feeling as of falling from a great height … but this time he remained conscious throughout the process, landing somewhere with a stiff bump. Now, where am I? He spied a cottage at the top of a low hill. Next to it, he created a big, beautiful shade tree. Yep, I’m in the right plane. Where else I am doesn’t much matter for now. He started walking toward the cottage.

      To date, Jay’s still in the early phases of that Mission; Home will have to wait for a while yet.