A Living Hope

30 March 1929 | Cincinnati Enquirer

A Living Hope by Dr. Jesse Halsey, Minister of the Seventh Presbyterian Church

God and Father—Our Lord Jesus Christ—A Living Hope—The Resurrection—An

Inheritance Incorruptible—I. Peter 1:3-4

Easter comes with its message of Hope and Courage; like all deep things it begins in mystery. We don’t pretend to understand all that happened on the first Easter Day nineteen centuries ago, but we believe that the Lord Jesus showed Himself alive to his friends, and that in their new-found faith they went out to transform the world. Faith in God leads one to expect the great and mysterious. We live in no simple world; mystery—the mystery of life and death—surrounds us. We reach out beyond the things we see.

I believe first of all because I want to believe. One, at times, may argue the question of immortality and consider the case unproven, but let some one of his own flesh and blood pass within the veil and reason surrenders the place to love, so that many a hard man has set his face toward God in hope of one day seeing a little head on which the sun is ever shining. Napoleon said that the heart was a place in the body where two large veins met, and that a statesman needed to have his heart in his head. The same ideal possesses the formal philosopher. It is only when one says with Tennyson, “I have felt,” that he will experience the strong urge of the unseen world. “I can’t and I won’t disbelieve.”

This does not mean that our hopes are unreasoned and are but a fond imagination. There are good and sufficient reasons for believing, but first comes the attitude of mind and heart that is positive, constructive, and desirous.

We are citizens of two worlds. One is material and tangible, like water; the other is spiritual, unseen, intangible, like air. But the latter is no less real than the former. Our bodies are of the earth earthy, but we are spirit, living in a transitory earthly tenement. Some day we will slip off this “body of humiliation,” but the eternal spirit will take its way to God, who is the Author of life and our Eternal Home.

It is not selfishness that makes us want to live on, but a stern conviction that the best that the universe knows is that spiritual reality, which we vaguely call personality. The faith and hope and love that we have experienced in life—our friendships, all convince us of the value of persons. If anything in the universe has permanence, it ought to be these supreme values. Such values we enthrone at the heart of things in God.

And in Jesus Christ we have seen all lovely qualities incarnate. His life—so beautiful, so strong—we call divine. Is it reasonable to think that reality like this goes out in death? Can a few nails and a Roman spear end such a life? If death could destroy Jesus Christ I find my essential faith destroyed—faith in the reality of all human values; faith in God; faith in reason; faith in an ordered universe. Then the materialist is right—biochemistry explains everything in the realm of human life and faith and love and hope mean nothing!

So while we keep the feast of the Savior’s Immortality we pause in grateful remembrance of all the pure and beautiful souls who have walked with us in strength and gentleness and love. We are strengthened in the assurance that what was bound up with our life and made a dear part of our being cannot be lost; that they and we are safe in the hands of God our Father, who brought Jesus Christ through the experience of death into a new life which those who follow Him may share. God is the God of this and every world, visible and invisible. Character like Christ’s resides in Him, and He is pledged by the very nature of His being to honor the supreme qualities for which the whole creation labors.

"Character Is Formed In School of Hard Knocks," Rev. Jesse Halsey Says

17 June 1929 | Cincinnati Enquirer

To Show Traffic Accidents

5 November 1928 | Cincinnati Enquirer

Phil E. Ziegler “pioneer in the organized labor movement”

6 June 1928

 

Dear Dr. Halsey:

I have been out of the city for the better part of month and just heard about your great sorrow. I sympathize with you deeply.

Sincerely,

Phil E. Ziegler

[grand secretary-treasurer of the Brotherhood of Railway Clerks]

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Cincinnati Enquirer | 21 April 1957

Margaret "Peggy" Burchenal Rogan

Cincinnati Enquirer | 22 April 1926

20 May 1928

Roger Kemper Rogan to JH

Cincinnati O

Dear Dr. Halsey,

I know how futile words are at a time like this. I know how empty phrases are. Words of condolences help little. At the same time knowing from experience what tortures you and your wife are living, I can not refrain from offering you my sympathies in this your hour of bereavement.

My wife joins me in sending to you and Mrs. Halsey our love and our prayers.

May the same all wise God who took back until himself our glorious little Peggy give you strength and courage to carry on until this short time is past and we are all reunited around His throne.

Most sincerely yours,

Roger Kemper Rogan

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"Is There No Way?"

22 May 1928 | Cincinnati Enquirer

"The Little Levite"

Messenger | 10 June 1928

The Jesse Halsey Manuscript Collection. Special Collections, Princeton Theological Seminary Library.

Letter from Francis G. Peabody to Jesse Halsey

Francis Greenwood Peabody was born in Boston on December 4, 1847, to Mary Jane Derby and Ephraim Peabody, a Unitarian minister. After Ephraim Peabody's untimely death in 1856, his former congregation provided the funds for his son's education. Francis graduated from Harvard College (1869) and received degrees from the Divinity School (1872) and from the Graduate School (1872).

After a brief time as chaplain and teacher at Antioch College in Ohio, Peabody served as minister at the First Parish in Cambridge, a Unitarian church. In 1880, Peabody became a lecturer on ethics and homiletics at Harvard Divinity School. He subsequently served as the Parkman Professor of Theology (1881–1886), Preacher to the University (1886–1906), Plummer Professor of Christian Morals (1886–1912), and Dean of the Divinity School (1901–1906).

Although Peabody strongly influenced the religious, moral, and philosophical climate of Harvard as the University Preacher and Plummer Professor, his most enduring achievement was his introduction of the study of social ethics to the Divinity School and Harvard College. Peabody's social ethics courses stressed the need to study the religious and social implications stimulated by industrialization, and he championed social-science methodology, the case study method, and liberal interpretations of the New Testament. In his teaching, preaching, and writing, Peabody characterized Christianity as a religion that required Christians to act as agents of social change, de-emphasizing personal salvation in favor of social action. He also used photography to document social problems and strengthen support for social reform.

Letter from Irvine L. Dungan to Jesse Halsey

With thanks to: The Jesse Halsey Manuscript Collection. Special Collections, Princeton Theological Seminary Library.

"generally gone to pieces"

Letter from Rev. Charles F. Goss to Jesse Halsey

With thanks to: The Jesse Halsey Manuscript Collection. Special Collections, Princeton Theological Seminary Library.

Letter from George Heatheole Hills to JH

May 1928

Letter from Rev. Walter H. Reynolds to Jesse Halsey

May 22, 1928

Letter from Harry Blocher to Jesse Halsey

1928

Letter from Rev. V. W. Jackson to Jesse Halsey

1928

With thanks to: The Jesse Halsey Manuscript Collection. Special Collections, Princeton Theological Seminary Library.

Wilmun Halsey | Obituary

Southampton Press | 24 May 1928

Billy Halsey | Cincinnati | c1926

Little Wilmun, youngest son of Rev. and Mrs. Jesse Halsey of Cincinnati, Ohio, died on Sunday last as the result of an automobile accident. The funeral was held on Tuesday in the Seventh Church of which Rev. Mr. Halsey is minister and the burial was made in the family plot in the Southampton cemetery on Wednesday afternoon. A brief and impressive service was held in the Halsey home, North Main street, where the [?] by neighbors and friends who will [?] [Billy was] well known in the neighborhood and a favorite among all his playmates. Wilmun was eight years old, and the hearts of very many go out in sympathy to the stricken family in their deep and irreparable loss.

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Rev. Henry Sloane Coffin, D.D., was in Southampton to conduct the funeral servce held for the little son of Rev. and Mrs. Jesse Halsey on Wednesday afternoon. Rev John Christie of the Mt. Auburn Presbyterian church in Cincinnati and Rev. David Garrett Smith assisted with the service.

Dr. Coffin is well known in Southampton, as when a boy his parents made their summer home here. Before becoming president of Union Theological Seminary he was for sixteen years the pastor of the Madison Avenue Presbyterian church in New York City.