Al Matteucci, an All Saints’ parishioner since 1999, was paralyzed following a race car accident Nov. 2, 2008 on a drag strip at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park in New Jersey.
At the time of his injury, Al was initially paralyzed from the neck down. Since then, he’s regained some movement in his neck, arms, fingers, legs and toes.
While traumatic, the experience changed his relationship with God in profound ways.
As told to Rose Fitzsimmons, this is Al’s testimony on how God impacted his life in even the most dire circumstances.
~~~~~
“When are you going to stop racing?”
I wasn’t sure where that thought came from, but I was instantly mortified because I had no intention to quit and I realized it was idolatry toward God. I immediately got it all out of my head and pretended that I never heard it.
Several days later with that thought out of my head, my focus was on to the coming weekend’s race in New Jersey, the last of the year. I’d made plans to stay with a friend that Saturday, so I’d be rested for the race on Sunday. In the middle of loading my car on the trailer for the trip, my phone rang. It was my brother, calling from Los Angeles.
“Hey Tony, what’s happening?”
“You wouldn’t believe the accident I just saw!” Tony’s voice shook as he described the scene that had just taken place on the six-lane, divided highway in front of him. “A car jumped the divider and headed right for me. It looked like he was going to ram into me, but he went behind me and hit the car behind me and parts went everywhere, it look like an explosion.”
As soon as he said it, I knew.
I’m going to be in an accident.
For a brief moment, I considered calling my friend in New Jersey to say I couldn’t make it. But pride wouldn’t let me.
I’ll just make a point to be very, very careful driving up and back.
The next day, As I drove down my street on the way out of town, I glanced back at my house and a strange thought drifted across my mind.
I might never be back.
~~~~~
That Sunday morning as I put up the hood of my Ford Fairlane, I could only grin. She was running better than ever, running right at ten seconds in both time trials, and I knew the crisp November air would only enhance her performance. I was thrilled. The car never went that fast before.
When the call came to line up for the first round of elimination, I took my place in the right-hand lane, my heartbeat pounding away like a drum.
This is what it’s all about.
The instant we left the line, my car started drifting left. I knew that if I even touched the white line dividing the two lanes, I’d be out. However, as I tried to correct slowly, I not only touched, but crossed the line.
Eliminated. Before I could even get going.
That should have been that—back off the throttle, coast to the end of the track, and then return to the pits and take the car home.
But the inviting empty strip of gray stretched ahead of me. Beckoning. I hadn’t come all this way to sit on the sidelines, not with this car so perfectly dialed in.
Let’s just see how fast this baby can go, Maybe into the nines.
I brought her back into my lane and switched into third gear, this time drifting right. I saw the concrete wall coming near.
This will scrape the bumper, for sure.
But it was more than a scrape. I hit the wall at just the right angle. The concrete “grabbed” the metal of my car, opposing the acceleration force so severely it felt as if I’d been hit from behind at 60 mph while sitting still. Something snapped in my neck. My car continued forward.
I can’t lift my head!
If I opened my eyes, I could only see my lap, so I closed them tightly. My hands dropped from the wheel and hung useless at my side, but my foot remained on the gas pedal.
This is a real mess.
The car continued to the left wall, bounced off that and back to the right wall, bouncing again like a pinball. Then it came to a slow stop in the left lane just past the finish line, narrowly avoiding hitting the wall again.
I can’t believe I’m still conscious.
Unable to do anything but stare at my lap, I could get not hear the emergency crews quickly approaching my car.
I can’t breathe.
Lord, this is in your hands.
I passed out.
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There’s a certain irony to my accident that I can never ignore when telling this story. Before I wrecked, I spent years learning to rely on God’s help, And I learned that, although I had so little control over events in my life, I could trust God’s way, which is far better than mine. Yet, for those few seconds on that crisp November morning, I was in full control of that race car. I could have pressed the brake as easily as the gas pedal.
God did not LET me crash into that wall. He let me have my way.
Then he walked me through it.
Within minutes of the crash, the emergency team had me in the ambulance and on oxygen.
When I woke, hours later, I had no idea where I was, and couldn’t remember the accident, the race, or anything.
Then came the questions.
“Mr. Matteucci, can you try to move your toes? Can you feel your fingers?”
These are the dumbest questions. Of course, I can’t. I don’t have to try.
I learned later that my shoulder harness had been loose, which was also my fault alone, and so my head had hit the steering wheel. The sudden deceleration upon impact gave me a concussion and a black eye.
The impact also shattered my second vertebrae. One of my childhood friends, an orthopedic doctor in Connecticut, came down to see me and talk to the doctors. Then he sent word to my high school pals back in New Mexico, saying my condition was, “The worst injury short of dying.”
When the doctors realized my breathing was not going to come back, they inserted a trach that prevented me from talking. I couldn’t ask questions and I couldn’t answer them. I could only think.
Wow, this is bad. I need to pray.
I tried to pray, but I simply couldn’t. A frightening vision kept playing through my head, in which I was at the bottom of a 55-gallon drum. On top of me was a devilish looking creature jumping up and down. Whenever I stopped trying to pray, it would disappear, but if I prayed, it came back in an instant. This went on for hours or days. I can’t remember. It was so scary, I couldn’t keep it up. That devilish thing wanted me to stay in the can. I didn’t understand why; I just knew that I couldn’t get out. When Father Mark, a pastor from our church, came to visit with some parishioners to see how I was doing, I could only mouth, “Pray for me.” I couldn’t explain what was going on. I’ve never told them what was going on as they stood around me.
After a month, as I started eating and drinking, they switched my trach with one that allowed me to talk. That’s about the time I started seeing more clearly how all the details leading up to the crash fit together—my pride, my decision to keep going, and all God’s warnings, as well as what happened in that hospital room. I didn’t understand it back then, but I know now the devilish thing thought I should be dead. Today I see how important that victory would have been because, at the time, despite what I thought about myself and my life, I did not yet belong to Christ. With the extra time I’ve been granted, I’ve learned that I was just going through the motions of being a Christian; I got involved with everything, and I enjoyed the benefits of prayer, but God wanted my heart. To give him anything less did me no good. It would take several years before I figured that out.
Essentially, God put me in a place where I had to look at him.
“Well, God,” I said. “You have my full attention.”
~~~~~
No, I don’t harbor any anger toward God, because I caused that crash. At times, I’ve been angry that He didn’t fix me, but it’s hard to justify my frustration when I drove the car into the wall. He warned me it would happen, I said it wouldn’t, and then it did.
I learned my injury was called, “incomplete” which means some use can come back after a year or two. After that, they said, I won’t see much change. However, I still see changes continuously.
That was 2008. I spent nearly all of 2009 in the hospital, which is a rare blessing, considering insurance rules, but all I’ll say is God provided. When I finally did get to come “home,” moving into a place in Woodbridge, I couldn’t use my hands, so Seth, my son, brought me some devices to help me use a computer.
Then, for the first time, in my life, I set out to understand, not just read the Bible, or to use it as a reference the way I had before.
I started with the New Testament. The sheer volume of information I didn’t understand led me to Bible commentaries. I’d read a verse, then pour through the commentaries until I really understood what I was reading. I particularly like Matthew Henry’s commentaries because he addresses phrase-by-phrase. Now I’m working through the Old Testament. I still don’t understand everything, but I will keep at it. I did learn enough to give my life completely to the Lord. He now has all of me, and I have Him.
For years after the accident and after spending some time in thinking, I could recognize my divorce was necessary to allow me to be drawn in a different direction; it led me to Virginia, to All Saints’ Church, and to dealing with my pride so that God could get my attention. In my case, it was the only way. I don’t want to go through it again, but I am grateful today.
Everything I had, I lost. What I’ve gained is much more: a true relationship with Jesus.
I’ve seen it affect others around me, in my daily life and in my family. One of my aides back in the hospital, George, would dress and feed me every morning, and once I was in my chair he’d go over and get my Oswald Chambers devotional. This went on for weeks and months. I imagine he was wondering what kept me studying God’s word. Then, just before I left the hospital, he came in one morning and said something had happened. “I got this thing called ‘The Daily Bread,’ and I really like it.”
There was also a young woman who cared for me upon my return from the hospital. She’d been born and raised Catholic, but didn’t go to church until she realized I went every Sunday, and now she does.
One of my evening aides back in the hospital, “Juice,” whose real name is Glen, had a friend called “Preacher Man.” One night Preacher Man asked if he could pray over me.
“Sure!” I thought I was about to hear something mind-blowing and uplifting.
“The Lord is my Shepherd,” he started, eyes closed.
I nearly interrupted, my mind shouting, “No, I know this one.”
Then he said, “I shall not want.” And he stopped. That was it.
Almost immediately, the entirety of my situation sank in.
Here I am, with no insurance, yet on life support systems, in a hospital with a roof over my head, getting good meals . . .
I shall not want.
Since then, I’ve memorized that psalm and much more.
~~~~~
My aide helped me settle in to my spot at the back of the sanctuary at All Saints’ Church. A few years had passed since my accident and we had moved to a new building on Gideon Drive in Woodbridge.
On this particular Sunday, a guest speaker had been talking about increasing our faith, particularly with regard to experiencing all the Holy Spirit had to give us.
The speaker asked me and said, “I’d like to pray with you, would that be all right?”
I’m never one to turn down an opportunity for prayer, so I nodded, imagining he would pray for my complete healing. But he surprised me.
“Mr. Matteucci.” He looked at me thoughtfully. “Where do you suppose Jesus was when you were in that accident? Do you ever wonder that?”
It was an unusual question. While I knew Jesus promised to never leave or forsake me, I had to admit, the evidence of His presence at that moment did seem rather sparse.
“I don’t know,” I answered.
Asking me to focus on that question, he then started to pray. Frankly, my mind did anything but focus. I pictured the scene in my car, bouncing from wall to wall, and then coming to a stop, just inches in front of another wall.
What do I think? What is God going to tell me?
My mind raced. Initially, I couldn’t “hear” anything from God, but then I just blurted out the words that came to me.
“He’s right there, in front of the car with His arms spread outward.”
Honestly, I thought I made it up. The speaker smiled, satisfied that I’d had a breakthrough. I wasn’t so sure.
At the end of the service, one of our pastors, Father Alex, came to me with a message from his wife, Rebecca.
“Al,” he said. “When we were praying, Rebecca received a clear picture of Jesus, standing with his arms out in front of your car. She didn’t want to say anything because she wasn’t sure if she made it up or if it was real.”
In a second, I knew Jesus had spoken to me. He was telling me he had saved me from a tragic death because He had more in store for me. Much more.
As I ponder my situation today, I don’t think God gets the best economy with me walking. I see things all the time that happen because of what I’m going through. I think God has me right where he wants me. I’d love to be a little more independent, but I have to remember that that’s what got me into this wheelchair in the first place.
Instead, God has been there throughout the journey, bringing people and assets and solutions into all situations, encouraging me to keep trusting Him for everything I need.
And I do. The Lord is sovereign, you can put your trust in Him. He won't disappoint you.