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More than three months ago, a few women came to Grace Community Church with no jobs, no home and, some said, no hope.

On Tuesday, they spent their last night at the church’s emergency shelter, one of several community sites set up to house the homeless through the winter months.

Volunteers cooked steak dinners for the shelter residents and shared stories of fellowship fostered by the effort.

“It has given me hope,” said Michele Marsh, 51, who has been at the shelter since it opened in December. “I can see a future now.”

The emergency shelters served 36 women and 132 men over the three months they were open, said Sheron Sumner, who oversaw the program. Not everyone stayed for the entire time.

“I think the Lord’s hand was at work here,” said the Rev. Mike Aiken, executive director of Greensboro Urban Ministry. “Because it turned out to be much more than it originally was planned out to be.”

Shelter residents and volunteers developed relationships. and many were connected to resources that helped them find jobs, deal with addictions and even reconnect with estranged family.

“That was the real benefit,” Aiken said. “Many friendships were developed. A lot of stereotypes were destroyed. ... Homelessness received a face, a very personal face for many people.”

Many, such as Marsh, also secured housing or were close to finding a place by Tuesday.

Patsy Johnson, whose stroke more than a year ago played a role in her homelessness, spent most of her time at Grace crocheting. It took a month to make the blue blanket that she gave to shelter coordinator Marsha Cole as a thank you Tuesday.

“I was giving up,” Johnson, 45, said. She credited the support she received at Grace’s shelter with boosting her confidence.

She hopes to get a job and said Grace has lined up housing for her for at least the next nine months.

“It was a real walk of faith,” Cole said of running the shelter, which received donations and support from 15 other churches in the community.

Cole said she’s proud of the city for stepping up to care for those in need.

Officials would like to start the emergency shelters earlier next winter and extend them from three months to four months.

Most of the sites already have agreed to open again, Sumner said. She hopes additional sites can be found next year: one each for women, families and men.

Sumner would like the program to have a social worker to help next year. And she would like the shelters to start working earlier to help residents find jobs and housing.

But affordable housing already is hard to come by, Sumner said. And it becomes more difficult with the poor rental histories that many of the homeless have.

“So finding landlords and people who will offer grace and give people second chances is a very hard job,” she said. “If things were a little more flexible in that capacity ... then that transition out would be much easier.”

Jerome Lewis, 52, received help from a new nonprofit to secure a rental house. He’ll be sharing with other men he met at the shelter at the Hive, a cooperative community center in Glenwood.

The nonprofit also has lined up two other homes.

A shelter resident at the Hive cooked a farewell feast Tuesday for volunteers.

“It feels like a family reunion,” Lewis said, “everybody saying goodbye.”

Contact Jennifer Fernandez at 373-7064 or jennifer.fernandez@news-record.com