The Road Back To New Jersey: How The Holy Spirit Led Me Home
Religion Unplugged believes in a diversity of well-reasoned and well-researched opinions. This piece reflects the views of the author and does not necessarily represent those of Religion Unplugged, its staff and contributors.
(OPINION) I grew up in Hackensack, New Jersey, a suburb of New York City.
I graduated from Hackensack High School in 1971, got my B.A. from Cornell University in 1975, a master’s in magazine journalism from Syracuse University in 1976, and landed a job as a sports reporter for the daily newspaper of Cortland, New York, in 1977.
So on the surface, everything was going great. But personal difficulties, with great help from Satan, almost swallowed me up. However, they led me, a Jewish young man, to give my life to Jesus in August 1978. You can read that story here.
A little less than a year after I was saved, I was living in Ithaca, in upstate New York, attending Hillside Alliance Church. Very suddenly, I remembered three incidents from high school that greatly troubled me. They troubled me so much that they were all I could think about. I could barely concentrate on my job. I soon recognized that the Holy Spirit was convicting me of sin related to those three incidents. I had the overwhelming urge to travel back to Hackensack and try to make things right.
I got time off from work and drove four hours to my hometown. It’s hard to describe, but as I entered Hackensack, I felt a spiritual presence, as if I was seeing the place I grew up with new eyes.
One of the incidents involved my best friend in high school. I had played high school junior varsity basketball. My friend was not as athletically inclined, although we both loved sports. One day we were both hanging around the outside basketball courts at our high school, watching a pickup game.
When the game ended, one of the players left and his teammate asked me to play. Without thinking about my friend, I went ahead and played, leaving him on the sidelines to watch. When I saw him later in the day while we were both visiting another friend, he almost attacked me physically, although he didn’t say why he was angry. We were never close after that.
So when I returned to my parents’ home in Hackensack, after first explaining to them that I had some old business to clear up, I phoned my friend and apologized for what I had done that day on the basketball court. He seemed embarrassed by my apology and shrugged it off like it was no big deal. But I knew I had done the right thing by apologizing.
My next stop was at the place of business of a classmate who had mercilessly and cruelly verbally harassed me for a couple of years in high school. I realized I needed to forgive him. I explained to him that it had hurt me, but I was there to tell him I forgave him. He seemed not to remember what he had done to me, but we separated that day on good terms.
Lastly, when I was younger, perhaps a freshman in high school, I was playing a pickup touch football game. On the opposing team was a guy a year younger than me but very small, much shorter than the average eighth grader. My team was losing and I was not playing well. Out of frustration, on a kickoff return, when I was blocking, I intentionally tripped him rather than throwing a legitimate block, and sent him sprawling. Nothing was said, but it was clear he didn’t appreciate it.
Now, some 11 years later, I was convicted to knock on his door and apologize. I tried, but no one answered. I went back to my parents’ home. About an hour later tried again.
Still no answer.
I needed to head back to Ithaca, so I packed up, got in my car, and drove away. My parents lived very close to the railroad tracks, which I had to cross. But as I approached, a man stood in front of the tracks, waving some sort of train signal sign, and, looking directly at me, yelled “Go back! Go back!” I can’t explain why, but it was clear to me he was telling me to not just go back from the tracks, but to go back to that young man’s house and try again.
So I did. This time, my friend answered. He was angry because he said the previous two times I knocked it had disturbed and worried his mother. I guess he had just arrived home and she told him about me knocking on the door. I explained why I was there. I need to mention here that in all three cases, I didn’t explain that I had become a born-again Christian. I didn’t look at this as a time to witness. All I said was that I had experienced a change in my life that made me aware of some things I needed to put right.
When I reminded this young man of the time I had tripped him and that I wanted to apologize, the change that came over his countenance was amazing. His face softened and I could see he was genuinely touched. He clearly remembered the incident. Perhaps no one had ever apologized to him before for pushing him around, given his small stature. That’s just my conjecture. In any case, I was so glad I went back.
Was that man at the railroad crossing an angel (Hebrews 13:2)? I will never know in this lifetime.
When I returned to Ithaca and related this story to my pastor, he told me that this conviction by the Holy Spirit had been happening to a bunch of members of our congregation as well. God was moving to purify us.
We know that the Holy Spirit convicts the world (unbelievers) of sin (John 16:8). But he also convicts believers of our sins. I have never again felt the weight of conviction as I did that time in 1979. But I am thankful how God cleared my conscience through the work of his Holy Spirit.
Matt Sieger, now retired, is a former sports reporter and columnist for The Vacaville (California) Reporter. He is the author of “The God Squad: The Born-Again San Francisco Giants of 1978.”