Marathon ministry trains runners to put 'one foot in front of the other'

In a few weeks Mark Simpson will lace up his sneakers, set out some five-gallon water coolers and start waiting for a miracle. Over the past ten years, Simpson, a 47-year-old pastoral counselor from Clinton, Mississippi, and his wife, Robin, have helped train more than 3,000 people to run a marathon.

Most, like Simpson, were couch potatoes before they started. They learned to run using a method that’s part fitness class, part prayer circle and part support group, concerned as much with spiritual transformation as with physical fitness.

“We have just hauled water and we have encouraged runners—and it has changed lives,” said Simpson.