The England of the seventeenth century, with its political and religious turmoil, was really not so different from the America of the twenty-first. Since the fall in the Garden of Eden, there has always been God’s way and man’s. Hence the timelessness of John Bunyan’s allegorical masterpiece, The Pilgrim’s Progress, which first appeared in 1678.

Forged from the Wilderness is the story behind the book, the story of John Bunyan’s life and of a little-known woman named Elizabeth, whom God much used to help shape him into the man he was called to be. By earthly standards, theirs was an unlikely union. Yet she became the dedicated stepmother of his four children, a courageous champion for her husband’s freedom from prison, and a catalyst for the publishing of his works.

Through meticulous research, I have endeavored to capture the real John Bunyan, the real Elizabeth, the real hardships they faced, and the real England of their time. How they lived in their world has much to tell us about how we ought to live in ours.