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I'm 29, and usually known for school assemblies and running the various Youth Groups at Seedfield Methodist Church in Bury, but on May 17^th I will be donning my shorts and running 26.2 miles to raise money for Open Doors, a charity that aids persecuted Christians in countries around the world by sending them materials for worship and youth work as well as campaigning to get Christians released from prisons in countries where it is illegal to practice the Christian faith.

"The most exercise I used to get was running after the kids,"

"The last time I got any serious exercise was in PE lessons at school. And that was 13 years ago! Now I'm doing 10k runs. And I've had to knock the fatty foods on the head. I must be mad!"

The hard work will all be worthwhile if I succeed in raising £2,000 for Open Doors. I've been a Youth worker for almost 8 years now and I have a real heart for youth workers in other countries and I feel the need to do something to help those who are being persecuted for teaching young people about Christianity.

"When I heard that in some countries of the world people were being put into prison or even out to death for doing the same work I do, I felt the need to do something about it.

It made all of my gripes about the difficulties of Church youth work seem so trivial.”

“Then I heard about the Charity Open Doors, who send Bibles, youth work materials and other such things to those that need them and did what they could to help those who were imprisoned and facing death, I thought this was a charity that I would like to help but I just didn't know how.”

“In May last year I turned 29, with 30 fast approaching I thought I should check my list of things to do before I reached the big three-oh, thankfully I had achieved most of the things I had wanted to do but there was a couple of things which I still hadn't got round to doing. One was to do something BIG, like run a marathon or something and the other was to visit China and see the Great wall.”

“So I put Great Wall of China into Google and up came “The Great Wall of China Marathon” as one of the hits. After some thought and prayer and asking my friends I decided that this event would be something great for me to do for Open Doors as it would be raising money for Christians in China by running in China and this idea tickled me.”

"Life is so difficult for Christians in other countries that I didn't want to do something easy to help them, I wanted to do something that would really challenge me and also give me just a taste of the hardship that others have to live with."

"The young people at our youth groups have been very generous and I hope others will sponsor me if they can," said Jon. "Even a few pounds will make a huge difference and mean Open Doors can continue their invaluable work supporting Youth workers and Christians like me."

Donating through this site is simple, fast and totally secure. It is also the most efficient way to sponsor me: Open Doors With Brother Andrew will receive your money faster and, if you are a UK taxpayer, an extra 28% in tax will be added to your gift at no cost to you.

So please sponsor me now!

If you would like to contribute funds to help me get to China in the first place please e-mail me and I'll give you my address

Many thanks for your support.