Scott’s Story
Written by Kiersten D. Troutman
He paused to take a long sip of his unusually strong coffee, while the sound of grinding coffee beans wailed in the background. He had walked to the local coffeehouse to meet me; his feet take him everywhere. His hands were worn and his legs tired, but his face had a story to tell. His hands wrapped around the hot mug, and soon the other coffee patrons seemed miles away as his story of discovery unfolded, a journey through pain, despair, hope, and renewal.
Forty-three-year-old Scott Grimm has walked a thousand miles with $1.79 in his pocket, a hockey bag full of clothes, and a pair of old slippers on his feet. He knows what the streets look like after dark. He knows their sounds. Loneliness is deafening.
His wife had kicked him out of their house in West Virginia when his alcoholism and drug use began to consume him. She filed for divorce. Unemployed and devastated at the separation from his one-year-old son, he was dropped off in his birthplace of Massillon in March 2010. Even his family members did not know what to do with him, and so he ended up in downtown Canton, on the streets…homeless.
The day he returned to Ohio, he attempted suicide…again. He had attempted it once before when he was only sixteen. He recalls this as his lowest moment; he had hit “rock bottom.” This time it landed him in the hospital cardiac unit for a week, followed by a week at the Crisis Center. Scott smiled, and added that it was “seven fabulous days…the pressure was off”, citing that it was as if the seven days were able to peel back layers of life’s daily pressures.
After his release, he went to the Refuge of Hope, where he stayed for a total of four months.
“I felt dehumanized, insulted to have to go there….but I met some great people there, a poet, a decorated vet. We discussed a lot of things, discussed Einstein.”
He walked and he walked and he walked, everywhere…in slippers. He saved money by selling plasma and doing odd-end carpentry work. His goal was to get off the streets and in to an apartment so that his son could visit him. He stopped using drugs and drinking alcohol. He grinned proudly, announcing that he has “been clean for one year” as of March 28, 2011.
His eyes became serious for a moment. “The homeless are not only a forgotten people, but completely ignored, because no one will look into their eyes.”
He took another sip of his coffee. I had to remind myself where I was. He went on. I was back in this compelling story.
Born Catholic, and raised Pentecostal by his grandmother, Scott knew Jesus, but only on a surface level. That was about to change. After three months of being at the Refuge of Hope, he was walking again, in conversation with God.
“It was a hundred degrees out, and my feet hurt.” He sat down on an abandoned porch step to read his newspaper in search of an apartment. He had saved $1,000 and was determined to find a place.
“You could smell the house [from the porch]. There was rotting food, dirty clothes, urine, feces, wild animals, and roaches. It was a crack house.”
Then he spotted it, an ad for a house for sale for $1,000. He came to realize it was the very house where he was sitting.
His first reaction: “Really, God?” He didn’t want it, but God told him that “this was the house” and that he “needed to fix it up.”
His obedience was tested when others scoffed at him, but he replied boldly, “God doesn’t take ‘no’ for an answer.”
What started out as a solution for him and his young son, soon evolved into something much bigger. It was God using a broken life to reach others stuck in the same despair. It was love working like a quick-moving stream, touching every life it ran through.
Construction soon got underway to revive this condemned home in a not-so-safe neighborhood, while God worked secretly behind the scenes. Scott encountered several stumbling blocks with bringing the house up to code, but with each time, his faith in doing what he was called to do proved to be rewarded. Several people stepped up to help him complete the tasks, including the need for a new roof.
In addition, a youth group from First Christian Church of Canton visited Scott’s house in the spring as part of a “Mini-Mission Weekend.” In response to their apprehension, Scott warmly replied, “Don’t be afraid of anyone in this neighborhood. Say ‘hi’, invite them to eat with us. It doesn’t matter what their addiction or life situation is; the death in their eyes is what would have attracted Jesus to them.”
Lacking a lot of the necessary tools, Scott admits that the first few doors were put up using a rock for a hammer. He noted that “faith can move a mountain, but you better have a shovel.”
It is quite obvious that God has given Scott the gift of communicating His love indiscriminately. He began to talk to his neighbors, and the homeless men that walked the streets. “God filled me up. I just talked to them and had them in for coffee.” These were people who struggled with their own problems, addictions, and despair.
“There were nightly break-ins, drunken arguments, etc… Now you hear the crickets at night,” explains Scott. “People now see people caring and working, and having fellowship. Neighbors are feeling respect, something they never had. We take pride in our neighborhood. We are a passionate group. We don’t just mow our own yard; we mow each other’s.”
It was quickly revealed to Scott that there was a serious need in Canton, on the very street with which he now lived: Sandal Place. He now holds informal Bible studies in his home, open to any who want to come.
Scott has a job now working the midnight shift for the electric company AEP. His future goals include purchasing more properties in the same neighborhood, within four blocks, to help get other homeless people off the streets.
As for Scott’s personal spiritual goal, he wants to “know God more, not just know Him, but what He takes in his coffee.”
It all started with one homeless, broken man who had a serious conversation with God and an insatiable desire to see how it would unfold.
Start listening. He’s talking.
