Allen Pinkley
I didn't plan to be a writer.
For most of my life, the story was lived, not written — through a childhood on Jackson Avenue, military service that took me further than I expected, nearly three decades of marriage to Amanda, raising three sons, and more than two decades serving as a Scouting volunteer on Florida's Space Coast and in the Florida Keys.
Writing came later, the way most things have in my life — not through careful planning but through a quiet nudge I couldn't ignore. One Sunday morning, a sermon stirred something unexpected, and I found myself scribbling the outline of a book I didn't know I had in me. That became The Path I Didn't Expect.
I write about faith the way I've lived it — not as a destination arrived at cleanly, but as a current you learn to trust. Ordinary moments, unexpected turns, and the slow accumulation of small yeses that shape a life over time. I'm not a theologian or a polished speaker. I'm someone who showed up, stumbled forward, and found God faithful in the spaces between certainty.
Through my service in Scouting and volunteer work at Wesley UMC, I try to make people feel seen and valued — trusting that Jesus meets us right where we are. When I'm not mentoring youth or serving at church, I'm caring for saltwater aquariums, tinkering with electronics, fixing something in the garage where reflection has a way of turning into prayer, or walking through parks with Amanda — the ones we've made our own since landing on Florida's Space Coast.
In the Order of the Arrow, the service honor society of Scouting, I was given the Vigil name Steady Current — chosen by others who witnessed something in how I served before I had language for it myself. That name has shaped me as much as I've tried to live up to it. It's also the name behind this press.
I'm still listening. Still saying yes to the next nudge before I feel ready. Still trusting that the path ahead — however unexpected — is already known by the One who called me onto it.
I live on Florida's Space Coast with Amanda, who said yes first and has kept saying it ever since.
The Path I Didn't Expect — Orienting My Life in Faithful Service is available now.