From Bondage to Freedom: A Life Change
By Joe Parham
My name is Joe Parham, I was born in Dallas, TX in 1971 by my mother Kathleen Parham and this is my story. I have a sister Jennifer, who is 44. I have another brother and sister that my mother put up for adoption in which, I will probably never meet. I was mostly raised by my grandparents and off and on by my mother. I was raised in a Christian home and was taught who Jesus was by my mother and grandmother at a very young age. I grew up mostly in the Shadle neighborhood in NW Spokane and although I was a regular boy who loved to play just like any other boy, I could not relate to most other kids because up to this point, my life was not really normal at all. Let me explain; my mother, six months pregnant, arrived in Texas with her boyfriend to live with his aunt Helena, who was an R. N at Parkland Hospital, to start a new life. Although I was not yet born, hidden from my mother was a truth that would soon surface and change not only her life but mine as well.
Upon arrival, things seemed to be good for them until one day my mother’s boyfriend went to go look for work and never returned. Helena told my mother that he has left to go back to Washington. My mother was shocked, later she learned that he was already married and expecting a child of his own and now the truth was being unveiled to her, in that, he lied to my mother to get her to come with him to Texas, so that when I was born, I would be sold to a couple in Mexico. This was the plan the entire time and now in the eighth month of pregnancy, the Mexican Mafia, with no hope in sight, trapped my mother. She was not allowed to have any outside contact and now realized that she was caught in a real life criminal “baby ring”. My mother finally got a small window of opportunity to sneak a phone call in. She called her Dad (my grandfather) and he sent some money for her to a local Western Union. The same day that my mother had the opportunity to call her father, she was also told that I was to be taken to Mexico that weekend and sold. They kept telling her that I would have a better life and that she would be fine.
My mother played along so that they would continue to trust her. It started raining very hard that night, more than usual and Helena, my mother’s boyfriends Aunt, had to go to work (night shift) at the hospital 10 minutes earlier due to the weather. Coincidently, her ex-husband and daughter, who were coming back from work to relieve Helena, would also be 10 minutes late getting there to watch me. My mother had been waiting for this break. Helena said “you can watch Jose’, it will only be for a couple of minutes”. While Helena was getting ready, my mother called the cab company to be there at a specific time . . . the time Helena was to leave. Amazingly, the Cab arrived right on time! She left with me, the clothes on her back, and a couple of bottles of formula. No sooner than the cab pulled down the street, Helena’s ex-husband came around the corner to the house. She told the cab driver to take her to Western Union and then to Trailways (bus depot) as quick as possible. She knew that they would be looking for her so she did not go to Greyhound. By the “Grace of God” in perfect “timing”, my mother got on that bus and brought me back to Spokane. As you can see, it was a miracle in itself, that I am now here, alive, telling my story!
When I was four years of age, my family and I went to a Dwayne Friend Revival in downtown Spokane at the Opera House. It was there that I met a man out back who was homeless and had recently lost his family due to alcoholism. He was a mess and was crying in pain. I did not realize it then, but God used me to witness to him about Jesus Christ. When my family finally realized that I was not with them they turned around and seen me talking with this man (stranger) and motioned for me to get away but soon perceived that I was telling him that Jesus loved him. They started talking to him and he said, “I do not want to hear from you, I want to hear from the boy”! Little did I know that what was going on that day was really what God had in store for me later in my life. When I was five or six, an older neighbor boy abused me on our block. Then it just was not me, but another boy my age, my best friend at the time. We were told never to say anything because we could be taken away from our families. The life I had already experienced is the reason why I did not say anything. I was in fear and shortly after that; I was discarded by both boys and made fun of because one day, I said no to them! It all came out and my parents found out what had happened to me. I was confused and did not know what to think.
This was about the time I started elementary school and it was hard. I felt like I did not belong and I was already having issues of my mother not being with me and lots of problems with insecurity, low self-esteem and did not have many friends, if any! By the time I was in Jr. High, I had already moved back and forth from my mother’s to my grandparents three or four times, including moving to Shelton and Walla Walla, WA. At this point I had started to rebel. This was the point where I believed the lies from Satan . . . believing that I had to be someone that I was not. I wanted so much to be liked and accepted . . . so I became someone that God did not intend for me to be. I started skipping school, smoking cigarettes, drinking, stealing and using pot to escape my pain. Now I had made a decision to start selling weed to cover my habits and lifestyle. I was living a lie that was told to me from the enemy . . . out of fear! I remember one time when I lived in Shelton, my mother was missing for 3 days, and my sister and I were left alone. We did not have any food so we went to Safeway and stole a weeks’ worth of food so that we could eat! Shortly after that, a police officer showed up at the door and I thought we were going to juvenile but they were there because they found my mother drunk on the side of the road, passed out and was in the hospital. We were taken into custody and put into foster care. We were soon returned back to my mother and we would soon move back to my grandparents.
The summer of 1984 was a time that I will never forget. I had just finished the 8th grade and summer was finally here! I was living at my grandmother’s house after moving back from my mother’s home in Walla Walla, when a ¾-ton pick-up truck with a camper on it struck me! On July 7th, I was coming back from my best friend’s house on my bike. I was travelling down Alberta Street when I looked up and a truck travelling south hit me dead on. My bike flew up into the air, landing across the street in the alley, and I was thrown underneath the wheels of the moving vehicle. The truck ran directly over my neck and chest discarding me out of the back of the vehicle, leaving me in a fetal position (curled up into a ball)! I was dead at the scene of the accident. By the grace of God, an off duty nurse lived on the corner of where I was struck, and quickly came to help me any way she could. She straightened my body and neck, in a “prone position”, and blood came rushing out of my esophagus, bringing me back to life. You see, my left lung had been punctured and I was bleeding internally! Then my heart stopped again and all I can tell you is that I felt like I was floating in a blackened abyss. Nothing there! I did not feel anything what so ever but I could hear everything. I heard all the people that were there panicking and I kept hearing voices that echoed saying “I think he’s dead, Oh my God”! I remember awakening for a moment and everything was foggy. I thought I was in the grass, moving my fingers up and down, feeling it in my hands but I was really in the middle of the street. I flat lined again! Then I remember talking with someone in the brightest light you could imagine and I was pleading to stay there because I was at peace and did not want to go back. All I heard was “no not right know”! During this time, the paramedics were trying to revive me and that is when I felt like I was surging down fast, faster than I have ever moved or had ever experienced before.
I opened my eyes and saw my grandfather looking upon me with the most concerned look I have ever seen! I tried to reach for him but I could not move or hardly breathe. I was put into the ambulance and rushed to Deaconess Hospital, but on the way I flat lined again. I remember seeing a kaleidoscope, like a “giant pie”, containing slivers of everything that was important to me all at once! Shadle Park, the pool, Shadle Mall, my room, my best friends, my family, even my bike! There was a lot more there but it is somewhat fuzzy to remember all of it now. Then I remember opening my eyes again and remembering that I could not breath. They kept telling me to keep my eyes open but I just could not! I flat lined again! Then I saw some things that I will never forget. I saw a man on a motorcycle almost get hit by a diesel and flew off the road down an embankment; saw a baby who was born pre-mature, lying in an incubator! Then I awoke and flat lined again in the elevator and then again on the operating table. I had died a total of seven times! I eventually awoke in ICU and I hurt like I never hurt before! It was as if God was with me because I did not break any bones at all! I did have a punctured left lung with my right lung severely bruised, 32 stitches above my right knee with a hole that went to the bone (where my sprocket went into my leg), tread marks on my neck and chest, and stitches and road rash on my head, shoulders, arms and legs! I was in ICU for 5 days and in a regular room for 1 1/2 days! I was released on July 14th, and as Dr. Baxter put it, “it is a miracle that you are alive”! Four days later, by the “Grace of God “, on July 18th, I turned 13 years old! I soon however, returned to my ways of using drugs and was now selling Marijuana and throwing parties.
When I graduated High school, I was already a well-known and established drug dealer. I had built an empire that would soon come crumbling down like the walls of Jericho! I started using cocaine when I met the mother of my soon to be child, Natasha! That was a very fast five years of my life. I had a $15,000 dollar phone list and was headed for destruction. I used to be out for myself and no one else. I had a ten-year addiction and my life was all about that next base hit! I was smoking more cocaine than I could attain in profit. I got arrested on a possession charge and I decided to call it quits. We soon had Natasha and then my worst fears were coming true! The mother and I split up because we discovered that without drugs, we did not like each other. My insecurity was coming back and I was fearful of being left alone. I was so screwed up from my past combined with my poor decisions that I did not know how to be a father. I wept and wept for days. I dove back into cocaine even harder trying to hide from my pain. Shortly after, I got ripped off for $1400 dollars, thrown out of a moving vehicle at 35 miles per hour, hit with brass knuckles and my right eye was hanging down to my cheek. I was left for dead on the side of the road where a mail carrier saw my emergency and called an ambulance. You would think that I was done then, but I wasn’t.
I tried to bounce back and be even better, but then I got introduced to meth. The meth took me for a ride . . . a ride that I wish I had never experienced. However, after living a dysfunctional life filled with terror and chaos, I was finally brought to my knees by meth! Dysfunction was so close to me that I thought it was my only friend. When my grandparents died I had nothing and nowhere to go; I was laid off from work and so I delved into selling meth, not by the gram, but by the pound! I was what you called a roller. Everybody was out for themselves. I soon realized that I was in hell with nothing but dysfunctional people around me. Although these things happened to me, I still did not change. I found myself in a “sting” operation at Safeway and soon went to jail. I had been arrested one other time at a Flying J truck stop at Geiger, and now they wanted to prosecute me for 5 years. My world was coming to an end. They told me that they knew about my 17-year history of being a drug dealer but I was very slippery. They could only prosecute me on three charges of which one was a double charge of possession. Therefore, that brought it to two charges and three felonies. Instead of a 5-year sentence, I got 6 months (By the Grace of God)!
When I got sent to Geiger I felt like I was still in the same place I had always been. There was no one to call to and no one to receive letters from. I was surrounded by the same chaos that I came from but now I was behind real bars. I had sold everything from pot to crystal meth to cocaine. I used to drink, and used just about everything under the sun except for shooting heroin. I was a worthless father to my child and this was reality for me at the age of 34. No future, no hope, no life worth living and no light at the end of the tunnel! I did not even know how to love or what it meant to be loved. I thought that I was destined to die a failure at life. More importantly, I felt guilt and shame because of my daughter and the way I was. Robbing her of her need for a father and a normal child hood was all that I could give her! At this time, my daughter was nine years old. What a mess!
I soon found myself crying out to God! I was mad and did not understand why I had been given this life that I was living. I cried out to God and said, “I’m tired of doing it my way, because my way is wrong and I do not have any strength to go on. Everything I put my hand to, I destroy! I do not know what to do, or where to go. I don’t even know how to act.” My body hurt from the meth that I had subjected myself to. It was very cold, and dark . . . I had no reason to live! It was at that point that I got on my knees and asked for something that I knew was there but did not know how to attain it. As soon as I asked the Lord to help me, I suddenly had a rush of emotion come over all of my body. It was there, that I was sitting in a cell . . . dark and alone! Then a sense of peace came over me; like nothing I had ever known before or ever remembering to have known. All these tears came flowing out of my eyes... and God told me that there is nothing impossible for Him (Luke 1:37). God showed me that he loved me for who I was and not what Satan had lied to me about. It was at this time that I requested a Bible. It was a Gideon Bible. I read and read and read! Although I did not understand too much of that which I was reading, I kept on reading. Only God must have known what was going to happen to me next because I would have never thought in a million years that I would be sitting in a room with 20 people praising the Lord while crying our hearts out! All of a sudden, there were all these hardened criminals around me turning into Christians! Talk about revival! They invited me to prayer, and a friend gave me the NLT. Suddenly the light bulb turned on and it all made perfect sense to me. I knew that the only way I could be free in prison or in life was to be free in Jesus. I gave my life back to the Lord and started attending prison ministry with Dick and Shirley Main. I thank God for them every day. A miracle has happened and not just to me! This was the beginning of the rest of my life . . . and I knew it! The Holy Spirit filled me with love, joy and peace. I said, “I am saved and I am precious to my Lord”! To think that the Lord wanted me and loved me for whom I was . . . even after all the things that I had done . . . I was amazed!
I bow to the Lord with my allegiance! I will follow Him for the rest of my days even though I may not be perfect I can be perfect in Him through Faith. God is my strength and power and He maketh my way perfect (2 Samuel 22:33). Danny Green baptized me December 4, 2007 and I am now 14 years clean and sober. I am blessed to have had a restored relationship with my mother, am also married to my beautiful wife Kristie Parham for 11 years, and I have not only my daughter Natasha, now 25 years old, but a son, Ryan, who is 17 years of age while owning our own home in Greenacres, WA.! I have worked with Off Broadway Family Outreach and The Dream Center ever since I was released from jail while also attending Family of Faith Community Church from 2008-2012 (CBC), where I was a member of the praise and worship team for 5 years and taught Advanced Adult Bible Study. I was also on the praise and worship team at OBFO where I am currently a Treasurer and an active Board Member. I also had the privilege to be an acting Founder/Board member of Church of God at Spokane in 2012. In 2012, I graduated from the Social Services program at SFCC with a grade point average of 3.7 and am currently working for Pioneer Human Services. I started at the Victory House, where we had a 35-bed facility for homeless Vets. In 2013, I started doing prison ministry with Dick & Shirley Main at Geiger Correctional Facility for the next 2 years. This is the same place that they ministered to me in 2007! In 2016, I was promoted to a Salary Position at Pioneer Human Services, as an Employment Specialist/Case Manager for Work Force Development as well as offering services at PCE inpatient & PCS outpatient/Spokane County Drug Court. Since 2018, I have changed divisions at Pioneer currently employed as an Employment Specialist with SRRC and Bureau of Prisons. God has also blessed me in 2020; having all three convictions vacated and expunged. Just recently in December of 2021, I was Ordained as a Pastor by by Bill & Judy Dropko. My family and I have attended Greenacres Christian Fellowship for the last 10 years with a wonderful Pastoral team, Bill & Judy Dropko, who have the heart of the Father and support Off Broadway Family Outreach and numerous ministries around the world. Having the Heart of the Father; that is the key to living a redeemed and fulfilled life! If I can do it . . . so can you. Miracles do happen! I am one of many that have chosen Jesus Christ to be my savior.
If you think you are a case that cannot be solved or if you are a problem that cannot be fixed let me introduce you to “Jesus Christ” the One and only true living God that is mighty to save... Halleluiah! If you are reading this and think that you want to meet this God, this Jesus... you can. He has promised! John 3:16-17 says “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life, God did not send His son into the world to condemn it, but to save it”. He will save you if you call upon His name and accept Him as Lord and Savior with all your heart (Romans 10:9-10). The power of testimony is the transformation of a person’s life just as in God’s testimony in John 3:16. It has the power to save others as well as an entire world! All God asked me to do was to believe. My name is Joe Parham and I am a miracle! All God has asked you to do is believe... so believe!
By Joe Parham
My name is Joe Parham, I was born in Dallas, TX in 1971 by my mother Kathleen Parham and this is my story. I have a sister Jennifer, who is 44. I have another brother and sister that my mother put up for adoption in which, I will probably never meet. I was mostly raised by my grandparents and off and on by my mother. I was raised in a Christian home and was taught who Jesus was by my mother and grandmother at a very young age. I grew up mostly in the Shadle neighborhood in NW Spokane and although I was a regular boy who loved to play just like any other boy, I could not relate to most other kids because up to this point, my life was not really normal at all. Let me explain; my mother, six months pregnant, arrived in Texas with her boyfriend to live with his aunt Helena, who was an R. N at Parkland Hospital, to start a new life. Although I was not yet born, hidden from my mother was a truth that would soon surface and change not only her life but mine as well.
Upon arrival, things seemed to be good for them until one day my mother’s boyfriend went to go look for work and never returned. Helena told my mother that he has left to go back to Washington. My mother was shocked, later she learned that he was already married and expecting a child of his own and now the truth was being unveiled to her, in that, he lied to my mother to get her to come with him to Texas, so that when I was born, I would be sold to a couple in Mexico. This was the plan the entire time and now in the eighth month of pregnancy, the Mexican Mafia, with no hope in sight, trapped my mother. She was not allowed to have any outside contact and now realized that she was caught in a real life criminal “baby ring”. My mother finally got a small window of opportunity to sneak a phone call in. She called her Dad (my grandfather) and he sent some money for her to a local Western Union. The same day that my mother had the opportunity to call her father, she was also told that I was to be taken to Mexico that weekend and sold. They kept telling her that I would have a better life and that she would be fine.
My mother played along so that they would continue to trust her. It started raining very hard that night, more than usual and Helena, my mother’s boyfriends Aunt, had to go to work (night shift) at the hospital 10 minutes earlier due to the weather. Coincidently, her ex-husband and daughter, who were coming back from work to relieve Helena, would also be 10 minutes late getting there to watch me. My mother had been waiting for this break. Helena said “you can watch Jose’, it will only be for a couple of minutes”. While Helena was getting ready, my mother called the cab company to be there at a specific time . . . the time Helena was to leave. Amazingly, the Cab arrived right on time! She left with me, the clothes on her back, and a couple of bottles of formula. No sooner than the cab pulled down the street, Helena’s ex-husband came around the corner to the house. She told the cab driver to take her to Western Union and then to Trailways (bus depot) as quick as possible. She knew that they would be looking for her so she did not go to Greyhound. By the “Grace of God” in perfect “timing”, my mother got on that bus and brought me back to Spokane. As you can see, it was a miracle in itself, that I am now here, alive, telling my story!
When I was four years of age, my family and I went to a Dwayne Friend Revival in downtown Spokane at the Opera House. It was there that I met a man out back who was homeless and had recently lost his family due to alcoholism. He was a mess and was crying in pain. I did not realize it then, but God used me to witness to him about Jesus Christ. When my family finally realized that I was not with them they turned around and seen me talking with this man (stranger) and motioned for me to get away but soon perceived that I was telling him that Jesus loved him. They started talking to him and he said, “I do not want to hear from you, I want to hear from the boy”! Little did I know that what was going on that day was really what God had in store for me later in my life. When I was five or six, an older neighbor boy abused me on our block. Then it just was not me, but another boy my age, my best friend at the time. We were told never to say anything because we could be taken away from our families. The life I had already experienced is the reason why I did not say anything. I was in fear and shortly after that; I was discarded by both boys and made fun of because one day, I said no to them! It all came out and my parents found out what had happened to me. I was confused and did not know what to think.
This was about the time I started elementary school and it was hard. I felt like I did not belong and I was already having issues of my mother not being with me and lots of problems with insecurity, low self-esteem and did not have many friends, if any! By the time I was in Jr. High, I had already moved back and forth from my mother’s to my grandparents three or four times, including moving to Shelton and Walla Walla, WA. At this point I had started to rebel. This was the point where I believed the lies from Satan . . . believing that I had to be someone that I was not. I wanted so much to be liked and accepted . . . so I became someone that God did not intend for me to be. I started skipping school, smoking cigarettes, drinking, stealing and using pot to escape my pain. Now I had made a decision to start selling weed to cover my habits and lifestyle. I was living a lie that was told to me from the enemy . . . out of fear! I remember one time when I lived in Shelton, my mother was missing for 3 days, and my sister and I were left alone. We did not have any food so we went to Safeway and stole a weeks’ worth of food so that we could eat! Shortly after that, a police officer showed up at the door and I thought we were going to juvenile but they were there because they found my mother drunk on the side of the road, passed out and was in the hospital. We were taken into custody and put into foster care. We were soon returned back to my mother and we would soon move back to my grandparents.
The summer of 1984 was a time that I will never forget. I had just finished the 8th grade and summer was finally here! I was living at my grandmother’s house after moving back from my mother’s home in Walla Walla, when a ¾-ton pick-up truck with a camper on it struck me! On July 7th, I was coming back from my best friend’s house on my bike. I was travelling down Alberta Street when I looked up and a truck travelling south hit me dead on. My bike flew up into the air, landing across the street in the alley, and I was thrown underneath the wheels of the moving vehicle. The truck ran directly over my neck and chest discarding me out of the back of the vehicle, leaving me in a fetal position (curled up into a ball)! I was dead at the scene of the accident. By the grace of God, an off duty nurse lived on the corner of where I was struck, and quickly came to help me any way she could. She straightened my body and neck, in a “prone position”, and blood came rushing out of my esophagus, bringing me back to life. You see, my left lung had been punctured and I was bleeding internally! Then my heart stopped again and all I can tell you is that I felt like I was floating in a blackened abyss. Nothing there! I did not feel anything what so ever but I could hear everything. I heard all the people that were there panicking and I kept hearing voices that echoed saying “I think he’s dead, Oh my God”! I remember awakening for a moment and everything was foggy. I thought I was in the grass, moving my fingers up and down, feeling it in my hands but I was really in the middle of the street. I flat lined again! Then I remember talking with someone in the brightest light you could imagine and I was pleading to stay there because I was at peace and did not want to go back. All I heard was “no not right know”! During this time, the paramedics were trying to revive me and that is when I felt like I was surging down fast, faster than I have ever moved or had ever experienced before.
I opened my eyes and saw my grandfather looking upon me with the most concerned look I have ever seen! I tried to reach for him but I could not move or hardly breathe. I was put into the ambulance and rushed to Deaconess Hospital, but on the way I flat lined again. I remember seeing a kaleidoscope, like a “giant pie”, containing slivers of everything that was important to me all at once! Shadle Park, the pool, Shadle Mall, my room, my best friends, my family, even my bike! There was a lot more there but it is somewhat fuzzy to remember all of it now. Then I remember opening my eyes again and remembering that I could not breath. They kept telling me to keep my eyes open but I just could not! I flat lined again! Then I saw some things that I will never forget. I saw a man on a motorcycle almost get hit by a diesel and flew off the road down an embankment; saw a baby who was born pre-mature, lying in an incubator! Then I awoke and flat lined again in the elevator and then again on the operating table. I had died a total of seven times! I eventually awoke in ICU and I hurt like I never hurt before! It was as if God was with me because I did not break any bones at all! I did have a punctured left lung with my right lung severely bruised, 32 stitches above my right knee with a hole that went to the bone (where my sprocket went into my leg), tread marks on my neck and chest, and stitches and road rash on my head, shoulders, arms and legs! I was in ICU for 5 days and in a regular room for 1 1/2 days! I was released on July 14th, and as Dr. Baxter put it, “it is a miracle that you are alive”! Four days later, by the “Grace of God “, on July 18th, I turned 13 years old! I soon however, returned to my ways of using drugs and was now selling Marijuana and throwing parties.
When I graduated High school, I was already a well-known and established drug dealer. I had built an empire that would soon come crumbling down like the walls of Jericho! I started using cocaine when I met the mother of my soon to be child, Natasha! That was a very fast five years of my life. I had a $15,000 dollar phone list and was headed for destruction. I used to be out for myself and no one else. I had a ten-year addiction and my life was all about that next base hit! I was smoking more cocaine than I could attain in profit. I got arrested on a possession charge and I decided to call it quits. We soon had Natasha and then my worst fears were coming true! The mother and I split up because we discovered that without drugs, we did not like each other. My insecurity was coming back and I was fearful of being left alone. I was so screwed up from my past combined with my poor decisions that I did not know how to be a father. I wept and wept for days. I dove back into cocaine even harder trying to hide from my pain. Shortly after, I got ripped off for $1400 dollars, thrown out of a moving vehicle at 35 miles per hour, hit with brass knuckles and my right eye was hanging down to my cheek. I was left for dead on the side of the road where a mail carrier saw my emergency and called an ambulance. You would think that I was done then, but I wasn’t.
I tried to bounce back and be even better, but then I got introduced to meth. The meth took me for a ride . . . a ride that I wish I had never experienced. However, after living a dysfunctional life filled with terror and chaos, I was finally brought to my knees by meth! Dysfunction was so close to me that I thought it was my only friend. When my grandparents died I had nothing and nowhere to go; I was laid off from work and so I delved into selling meth, not by the gram, but by the pound! I was what you called a roller. Everybody was out for themselves. I soon realized that I was in hell with nothing but dysfunctional people around me. Although these things happened to me, I still did not change. I found myself in a “sting” operation at Safeway and soon went to jail. I had been arrested one other time at a Flying J truck stop at Geiger, and now they wanted to prosecute me for 5 years. My world was coming to an end. They told me that they knew about my 17-year history of being a drug dealer but I was very slippery. They could only prosecute me on three charges of which one was a double charge of possession. Therefore, that brought it to two charges and three felonies. Instead of a 5-year sentence, I got 6 months (By the Grace of God)!
When I got sent to Geiger I felt like I was still in the same place I had always been. There was no one to call to and no one to receive letters from. I was surrounded by the same chaos that I came from but now I was behind real bars. I had sold everything from pot to crystal meth to cocaine. I used to drink, and used just about everything under the sun except for shooting heroin. I was a worthless father to my child and this was reality for me at the age of 34. No future, no hope, no life worth living and no light at the end of the tunnel! I did not even know how to love or what it meant to be loved. I thought that I was destined to die a failure at life. More importantly, I felt guilt and shame because of my daughter and the way I was. Robbing her of her need for a father and a normal child hood was all that I could give her! At this time, my daughter was nine years old. What a mess!
I soon found myself crying out to God! I was mad and did not understand why I had been given this life that I was living. I cried out to God and said, “I’m tired of doing it my way, because my way is wrong and I do not have any strength to go on. Everything I put my hand to, I destroy! I do not know what to do, or where to go. I don’t even know how to act.” My body hurt from the meth that I had subjected myself to. It was very cold, and dark . . . I had no reason to live! It was at that point that I got on my knees and asked for something that I knew was there but did not know how to attain it. As soon as I asked the Lord to help me, I suddenly had a rush of emotion come over all of my body. It was there, that I was sitting in a cell . . . dark and alone! Then a sense of peace came over me; like nothing I had ever known before or ever remembering to have known. All these tears came flowing out of my eyes... and God told me that there is nothing impossible for Him (Luke 1:37). God showed me that he loved me for who I was and not what Satan had lied to me about. It was at this time that I requested a Bible. It was a Gideon Bible. I read and read and read! Although I did not understand too much of that which I was reading, I kept on reading. Only God must have known what was going to happen to me next because I would have never thought in a million years that I would be sitting in a room with 20 people praising the Lord while crying our hearts out! All of a sudden, there were all these hardened criminals around me turning into Christians! Talk about revival! They invited me to prayer, and a friend gave me the NLT. Suddenly the light bulb turned on and it all made perfect sense to me. I knew that the only way I could be free in prison or in life was to be free in Jesus. I gave my life back to the Lord and started attending prison ministry with Dick and Shirley Main. I thank God for them every day. A miracle has happened and not just to me! This was the beginning of the rest of my life . . . and I knew it! The Holy Spirit filled me with love, joy and peace. I said, “I am saved and I am precious to my Lord”! To think that the Lord wanted me and loved me for whom I was . . . even after all the things that I had done . . . I was amazed!
I bow to the Lord with my allegiance! I will follow Him for the rest of my days even though I may not be perfect I can be perfect in Him through Faith. God is my strength and power and He maketh my way perfect (2 Samuel 22:33). Danny Green baptized me December 4, 2007 and I am now 14 years clean and sober. I am blessed to have had a restored relationship with my mother, am also married to my beautiful wife Kristie Parham for 11 years, and I have not only my daughter Natasha, now 25 years old, but a son, Ryan, who is 17 years of age while owning our own home in Greenacres, WA.! I have worked with Off Broadway Family Outreach and The Dream Center ever since I was released from jail while also attending Family of Faith Community Church from 2008-2012 (CBC), where I was a member of the praise and worship team for 5 years and taught Advanced Adult Bible Study. I was also on the praise and worship team at OBFO where I am currently a Treasurer and an active Board Member. I also had the privilege to be an acting Founder/Board member of Church of God at Spokane in 2012. In 2012, I graduated from the Social Services program at SFCC with a grade point average of 3.7 and am currently working for Pioneer Human Services. I started at the Victory House, where we had a 35-bed facility for homeless Vets. In 2013, I started doing prison ministry with Dick & Shirley Main at Geiger Correctional Facility for the next 2 years. This is the same place that they ministered to me in 2007! In 2016, I was promoted to a Salary Position at Pioneer Human Services, as an Employment Specialist/Case Manager for Work Force Development as well as offering services at PCE inpatient & PCS outpatient/Spokane County Drug Court. Since 2018, I have changed divisions at Pioneer currently employed as an Employment Specialist with SRRC and Bureau of Prisons. God has also blessed me in 2020; having all three convictions vacated and expunged. Just recently in December of 2021, I was Ordained as a Pastor by by Bill & Judy Dropko. My family and I have attended Greenacres Christian Fellowship for the last 10 years with a wonderful Pastoral team, Bill & Judy Dropko, who have the heart of the Father and support Off Broadway Family Outreach and numerous ministries around the world. Having the Heart of the Father; that is the key to living a redeemed and fulfilled life! If I can do it . . . so can you. Miracles do happen! I am one of many that have chosen Jesus Christ to be my savior.
If you think you are a case that cannot be solved or if you are a problem that cannot be fixed let me introduce you to “Jesus Christ” the One and only true living God that is mighty to save... Halleluiah! If you are reading this and think that you want to meet this God, this Jesus... you can. He has promised! John 3:16-17 says “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life, God did not send His son into the world to condemn it, but to save it”. He will save you if you call upon His name and accept Him as Lord and Savior with all your heart (Romans 10:9-10). The power of testimony is the transformation of a person’s life just as in God’s testimony in John 3:16. It has the power to save others as well as an entire world! All God asked me to do was to believe. My name is Joe Parham and I am a miracle! All God has asked you to do is believe... so believe!