‘The Rev’ COVER STORY Bill Roscoe: a man wit By Steve Bertel Since April, 2002, Rev. Bill Roscoe has been the President/ CEO of the Boise Rescue Mission. He’s the public face of the Mission, really – his appointment calendar filled with radio and TV interviews, civic club speeches, community meetings, and the like. His warm demeanor and easy laugh exude his love for the Lord. He’s a minister, a leader, a servant, a man of peace. But it wasn’t always that way. At age ten, Bill’s parents and their children – he’s the eighth of nine kids – moved from his birthplace, North Hampton, Massachusetts, to Marin County, California, just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. “I couldn’t have asked for better parents than what God gave me in terms of how much they loved us and how they took care of us,” Bill recalls. But, as for a God-centered upbringing, it was practically nonexistent. “There was no Christian training in our home at all.” His much-older siblings had already left the nest, “So my next-older brother, my little sister, and myself grew up going to Sunday school every once in a while, because my mother insisted on it. She and my father would drop us off at a local church, and then they’d go shopping or something while we went to Sunday school.” The reason? “Almost his entire life, my father had a very, very bitter taste in his mouth about religion. As for churches, he felt ‘All they want is your money.’” In the late ’60s, Bill was a typical teenager. “We’d hitchhike down to San Francisco and hang out with the hippies; after all, it was the age of sex and drugs and rock and roll,” he remembers. In that era, America was a nation divided. By politics, by the so-called “free love sexual revolution” … And by the Vietnam War. “I had two older brothers already serving in Vietnam by the time I was in high school. So I was rather unique: while a lot of my friends were protesting the war, I was on the other side of the fence, defending our military involvement there. My parents had instilled in us a healthy respect for law and order. Mom, apple pie, and the American flag were very important to all of us … so I always had that sense of patriotism and loyalty to my country.” That’s why, rather than graduating, Bill and two friends went to the local Army recruiting office and enlisted. But instead of being sent to the southeast Asian jungles to fight the Viet Cong, as Bill had hoped for, the military sent him in the opposite direction – to Germany. Of course, drinking beer has long been customary in that country. So, coupled with his deep frustration, Bill began drinking, throwing back many a mug. “It got me into a lot of trouble. I wasn’t a good soldier,” he readily admits. “I was really angry because my two buddies I had enlisted with had been sent directly to Vietnam. I knew they were in combat. And I was mad because they were both seeing action, while I was stuck in Germany.” He eventually got his wish, though, and was sent to South Vietnam, assigned to first build roads in the country’s remote central highlands as a combat engineer and later, working as a radio operator on dangerous reconnaissance missions. “It was exciting, challenging. And awfully scary. After all, it was war,” he says.
24 November / December 2021 | Christian Living
His tour eventually ended and, on the day he was scheduled to ship out, Bill received an urgent message. With devastating news. His father, back in the States, had been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer – and was given only months to live. “It rocked my world. After all, Dad was my hero. I had no idea he was even sick,” Bill remembers. “In his younger days, Dad was a bantamweight boxer; he was built like a rock, with not an ounce of fat on him. Plus, he had worked as a carpenter his whole life, so he had really stayed in shape.” That is, until years of smoking began taking their toll. Bill was assigned to San Francisco’s Presidio. That way, he could still serve in the military and live at home, and be available to drive his father to chemotherapy treatments. “All I knew was: I was mad. My dad was dying, literally melting away right before my eyes. I didn’t know what was going to happen to my mom; I didn’t have much money; my little sister was still in high school; and I was in charge of the family. It was an awful time. Here I was, just a long-haired, scruffy guy with no career goals – whose only experience had been in the military. And I didn’t handle it very well. At all. I drank and drank and drank. I got arrested for drunk driving, but got off the hook by paying a fine and having my license suspended for thirty days.” A short while later, another arrest. “It was a bad scene. I was at a party – under the influence again, and the police came to arrest a buddy of mine who was AWOL. I thought, ‘This is my Army bro. I can’t let this happen.’ So I took a swing at the officers and, of course, they handcuffed me, threw me in their patrol car, and booked me into the Marin County Jail.” After spending weekdays at the Presidio serving his military time and weekends behind bars serving his jail time, Bill decided to try to get his life in order. So, following his father’s footsteps, he joined a union and became a professional carpenter. When his father passed, the Roscoe household dynamics changed. His youngest sister – the last of the nine siblings – graduated high school and left home; his mother eventually remarried; and Bill himself wed his sweetheart, Sandy, the two moving farther north, to the growing city of Rohnert Park, near California’s wine country. On the outside, life was good. Bill was living the American dream. “I was swinging a hammer and pounding nails and making a good wage,” he fondly remembers. “I had a beautiful wife, two beautiful kids (a daughter and a son), a new truck, a house that we bought with the GI bill, good benefits, health insurance, the whole nine yards …” But on the inside, Bill’s life was in turmoil. He continued to drink – heavily. As a result, “My wife and I fought tooth-andnail all the time. She’d take the kids and leave me at least once a month. I’d come home from work and she’d be gone. No note. Nothing. She’d just be gone.” He’d routinely make a few phone calls, network with friends, and would eventually find where his wife was staying. And he’d go to her. “I swore to her, ‘If you come home, I’ll never drink again.’” Continued on page 26
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