The marathon went really well, thank you to everyone who sponsored me, the Rwandan orphans and the RSVP Trust will be blessed by your willingness to give and I'm sure the Lord is pleased.
Marathon day was a hot day, in fact I heard it was the hottest London marathon ever, so most people were running slow, which meant we were running for a long time, almost 5 hours. It was hard to get past people and you have to go with the flow, quite a lot slowed right down.
One in seven people were treated by the medical people for heat related problems. But the crowd support was excellent and very encouraging: "Cam on my san" as they say in London.
There were a lot of bands playing music along the way and some church bands were playing songs too. At one pub there was a very realistic Elvis singer, I enjoyed that, and a hot blues band at another, the music helps to spur you on, so many different styles of music, the Sikh drummers were fabulous, the Jazz bands and brass bands all helped, Music is such a great encouragement that God has given to us.
I met some great people as we all ran together, I got talking to one guy from New Jersey, he was doing his one hundred and first marathon.
The marathon is run over 26.2 miles, and because we were running so slowly my legs started to hurt around mile 13, the last 6 miles were tough but the Holy Spirit was with me, the Parakletos: "One who draws alongside to help". The Holy Spirit kept me going as He drew along side to help me.
My legs hurt little bit more with every successive mile, but I managed to keep going without stopping to walk which I was glad about. There's also no doubt about it, people who had sponsored me also kept me going, I was also thinking, "I hope these Rwandan kids appreciate this".
It's quite emotional too, the crowds really get behind the runners, and when you cross the finish line, it's easy to see how some runners collapse as emotional wrecks.
Running the marathon is a great parallel to running the race of faith, keep going, it gets hard some times but the Holy Spirit will draw alongside to help. Be aware that He is there and call out to Him, till we all get to that finish line. I'm also grateful for the scripture verses that people reminded me about, that helped too.
The day before the marathon Lorraine, Isaac and I spent some time in London and we had lunch at some beautiful fountains that people could walk in and out of, I noticed that there was a plaque at the fountains that quoted Psalm 1:3 "He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers." I thought about those words and trusted God to prosper me, and get me to the finish-line.
Paul Poulton
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