Rite of Purification
Maj. Gen. Terry Allen was a division commander during the North African campaign. He was third generation Army and raised by his father to be a soldier. The young Allen was “Saddle-hardened before he was ten,” and learned “to ride, smoke, chew, cuss and fight at the earliest possible age.”147 Later on, hard drinking became another characteristic, and this got him into trouble. It came to the attention of Generals Marshall and Eisenhower that the attitude toward alcohol was somewhat loose within Allen’s division and that Allen himself was drinking too much. Allen was warned about the problem and had an encounter with General Patton, who didn’t care for Allen’s rather loose interpretation of uniform regulations.
As Allen was about to go into battle, he tried to prepare himself by purging some of these stains. He described this in a letter to his wife explaining how he burned various personal records, including the letter in which Marshall had warned him about excessive drinking. By incinerating “all that stuff,” Allen told his wife, he hoped to purge all “rancor or ill-will in my mind or in my heart.” The little fire was like a rite of purification to give himself a clean slate going into combat.148
This story reminds me of a little ceremony that I once experienced during a regular church service. Each person was asked to write down the one thing that he or she most regretted having done. Later in the service we were invited forward to give these little pieces of paper to God and to throw them into a fire beneath the cross, where they were consumed. This act was to dramatize how God will remove any stain if, through his Son, we confess it and ask for his forgiveness. It was a powerful reminder of God’s grace and of our standing as adopted children in his family. Through Jesus Christ, and him alone, we always have the opportunity to gain a clean slate.
He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.
—Colossians 2:13–14