Larry VanHouse
This Little Light of Mine
I did not set out to write a book.
I set out to survive a season of my life that felt heavier than I expected and harder than I wanted to admit. Somewhere along the way, words started forming. Not polished ones. Honest ones. The kind you write when you are tired of pretending you have it all together. Surry Living Magazine became an outlet for me that I did not know I needed, but it was the right time and the right place.
Most men do not need another pep talk. We have heard enough of those. What we need is truth we can actually live with. Something solid. Something real. Something that does not talk down to us or dress faith up in language that feels borrowed.
That is where Forged came from.
There are several kinds of forging. One produces a forgery. Something that looks right on the outside but is hollow underneath. Another kind of forging comes through fire. Heat. Pressure. Repetition. Hammer blows. That second kind does not happen by accident, and it does not happen without discomfort.
Life has a way of putting men into the fire whether we ask for it or not.
Failure does it. Regret does it. Loss does it. Responsibility does it. The quiet weight of expectations does it. Sometimes it is dramatic. More often, it is slow and unrelenting. In those moments, we usually face a choice. Fake it. Numb it. Run from it. Or let it shape us.
Forged is built around that choice.
The stories in the book are not heroic. They are human. They come from mistakes I have made, lessons I learned late, and moments I would rather rewrite if I could. But I have learned this much. God does not waste pain. He uses it. He shapes grit through struggle, growth through reflection, and grace through Jesus Christ. Not as an abstract idea, but as a living presence that meets us right where we are.
This is not a devotional for men who love devotionals.
It is for men who do not like to read much at all. Men who are busy. Men who are tired. Men who are skeptical. Men who want faith to matter on a Tuesday afternoon, not just on Sunday morning.
Each week is short by design. A gritty story. A straightforward reflection. A practical takeaway. No fluff. No filler. No pretending. You can read a paragraph a day or a chapter a week. The point is not how fast you read it. The point is that you show up.
I often think back to training in martial arts, sparring with instructors who always seemed to be one step ahead of me. Every mistake hurt. Every correction stung. But every round made me better. Stronger. Sharper. More disciplined. That is how forging works. That is how life works. And that is how faith works when we stop trying to avoid the fire.
Forged is not about information. It is about formation.
It is about becoming something real. Not perfect. Not polished. Just honest. Strong. Faithful. Willing.
If you are tired of counterfeit versions of manhood, faith, or success, this book is for you.
Forged: 52 Weeks of Grit, Growth, and Grace for Men Who Do Not Like to Read is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other online bookstores, with local bookstore availability coming soon. Step into the fire. Do not settle for a forgery.
