Loyalty and Accountability
Reading Matthew 25:14-30
From time to time I escape from my desk overlooking the Treasury building in Hobart’s Macquarie St and cross Murray St for lunch at Hadleys.
Hadley’s is quite an institution in Hobart. It was built by convict labour and opened in 1849. It has operated continuously as a hostelry since then.
Early in March 1912, a rather disreputable-looking fellow booked into Hadleys, having just sailed into the Hobart docks. In his diary, he records that he was given a miserable room, probably because he looked like a tramp.
The fellow then tramped down Macquarie St to the Hobart Post Office where well-known Australian broadcaster Tim Bowden’s grandfather was the telegraph clerk and, after swearing the clerk to secrecy, had him telegraph none other than the King of Norway to say that he and his men had reached the South Pole, the first party to do so and some weeks ahead of Captain Robert Falcon Scott.
The disreputable fellow was, of course, the intrepid Norwegian Roald Amundsen.
If you came across to the conference on the Spirit of Tasmania, you may have eaten at the Captain’s Table cafeteria which sports large photos of Amundsen leaning on the rail of his sailing ship the Fram at the Hobart wharf. The photo shows a lean and weather-beaten man in a suit with a waistcoat, shiny black shoes and a felt hat, rather different from the tramp who booked into Hadleys a few days earlier.
Mind you, when Hadley’s management learned the identity of their guest, the hospitality improved suddenly, and they even put on a Christmas dinner for Amundsen and his crew, since they had missed out trekking to the Pole. I believe you can still stay in the Amundsen suite. Not unreasonably, Hadley’s has milked the connection for all it’s worth over the last century.
On 17 March 1912, Amundsen attended a service in St David’s Cathedral, across the road from Hadley’s, to welcome back his team and to pray for the party of Scott, who was in fact to lose his life some two weeks later in his attempt to get back to base. The world was not to learn of Scott’s fate, however, until the following summer.
Today, most of Australia’s Antarctic scientists live and work in Hobart. Hobart hosts the CSIRO’s Marine Laboratories, the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Ocean Studies, and the Australian Antarctic Division.
CCAMLR, the international organization devoted to conserving the marine living resources of the Antarctic, is head-quartered in Hobart.
Hobart has always had connections with the Antarctica.
The year before Amundsen, a geologist from Adelaide University who had been part of a Shackleton exploration party, set out from Hobart with the aim of charting a substantial part of the Antarctic coastline south of Australia. Dr Douglas Mawson had the confidence of his old teacher Edgeworth David, the renowned geology professor from Sydney, and Professor Masson from Melbourne, who together spearheaded the public fundraising to get Mawson’s expedition underway. That trip was a disaster in most respects, with serious loss of life. However, there was serious discussion between Mawson and Scott to see if they could combine forces for Scott’s trip. Perhaps fortunately for Mawson, this didn’t work out.
But to return to Roald Amundsen. He started out as a medical student but gave it away when his mother died and embarked on a life of exploration. He was the first person to successfully navigate his way through the so-called North-West Passage which had eluded Franklin, although he took several years to do it. Contact with Eskimos taught him a lot of survival skills which would have assisted his dash to the Pole. In a diary, Amundsen wrote:
“I may say that this is the greatest factor – the way in which the expedition is equipped – the way in which every difficulty is foreseen, and precautions taken for meeting or avoiding it. Victory awaits him who has everything in order – luck, people call it. Defeat is certain for him who has neglected to take the necessary precautions in time; this is called bad luck.”
Not content with reaching the South Pole, Amundsen set about sailing east to west across the top of Alaska – the North-East Passage, and later flew an airship across the North Pole, thus probably becoming the first person to reach both Poles.
When Amundsen had successfully navigated the North-West Passage, he reportedly wrote to the new King of Norway, Norway having just been formally separated from Sweden, informing him that it was a great achievement for Norway and that he hoped to do more, signing himself, ‘Your loyal subject, Roald Amundsen.’
His telegraph from the Hobart GPO delivered on that promise.
Amundsen clearly felt a strong loyalty and responsibility to his King.
Christian men and women, you and I, also have a loyalty above and beyond that which our current enterprise demands, whatever that enterprise may be.
Jesus taught his followers using a story about three people who were given bags of gold in trust for their master. The parable can be found in Matthew chapter 25 but also in Luke chapter 19.
There are several aspects to this story which resonate with me.
Firstly, the successful investment of the master’s bags of gold was no matter of luck. Even in the context of the extreme volatility of today’s stock market, there is no suggestion that the three servants were more or less successful at stock picking or market timing. No, all that was required – all that was expected – was reasonable, faithful effort.
Secondly, that reasonable effort reflected the de jure ownership of the resource and the relationship between the master and the servant.
And thirdly, whilst there is unabashed differentiation between the three servants, the first being entrusted with five times what the third received, the reward for the two faithful servants is identical. You and I may have very different tasks under God, face very different challenges, have very different opportunities. But we are called nevertheless to undertake those tasks, to meet those challenges, to take up those opportunities with faithfulness, with commitment, out of loyalty to the King of Kings.
Let us pray. . . .
See, COSAC – Conference: Science & Christianity 2011 and “Keeping on” (COSAC Devotion #1).
