Entertaining Strangers: Eccentric Hospitality

On Wednesday morning as we were preparing to leave Rockford, Ill., for the Cincinnati, Ohio, area we decided to go online and look for a hotel near the Creation Museum. Our goal was to make it to a hotel near the museum in time for an early bedtime, get up the next morning, tour the museum and travel the last leg of our journey home.

While on the museum’s website, I saw an advertisement for “Troy’s Creation House: An outreach to visitors of the Creation Museum.” It had a website which I looked through and decided to give them a call. I talked to Frank and found out that they had just had a cancellation and so were willing to have us come to their home that very night.

We told them we’d be there between 6 and 8 pm. We forgot about losing an hour due to time change. We forgot that trips always take longer than expected. And we didn’t know that Google Maps was taking us to a different “Treetop Lane” that would cost us an additional 40 minutes. After several phone calls we arrived a little after 9. Troy’s Creation House is not an inn, not a motel, not a Bed and Breakfast. It’s a private home (albeit, very new and nice).

Frank and Sue are eccentric. Eccentric is defined as “deviating from the recognized or customary character, practice, etc.” Who else do you know that would (at no charge) open up their home every night of the week to complete strangers? Yet this is just what they do to Christians wanting to visit the Creation Museum.

Frank is 100% an Answers in Genesis fan. He is 100% a MacArthur fan (He has nearly all his books on the shelf in the entry way). He is 100% a health-food fan (he has a “sad meal” that he bought at McDonald’s in 2005 and which he shows to all the guests—no mold or mildew has even touched it. It looks just like the day he bought it.). And he is a Creation Museum groupie.

Frank and Sue used to live in Pennsylvania. A few years ago, their 17-year-old son Troy was struck and killed in a motorcycle accident. That inspired the name “Troy’s Creation House.” Troy had been an avid creationist and being the youngest of the four children, his death was a severe blow and brought quiet to their home. Through the teaching of John MacArthur, they had developed a rock-solid faith in the absolute sovereignty of God and this is what they say sustained them through their trial. In a news interview shortly after the death of their son, Frank was asked why he wasn’t angry with God. His answer was: “Doctrine. If you have the right theology of God, you can’t be angry with God.” Ken Ham actually interview Frank and Sue a short time later and the CD was sent to all AiG supporters.

Frank and Sue served us (and another family from Phoenix) flax pan cakes and spinach/blueberry/almonds/walnuts/banana/stevia shakes. Mine was, uh, good. Really. I had the pleasure of knowing I was drinking pure health. I even liked the taste. They then had a little presentation in which they gave us three books including a pictorial overview of the museum, several CDs, and a “creation cube.”

After that, Frank led us over to the museum. He spends nearly every day of the week there. He absolutely digs the place. He was running back and forth between his two guest families, pointing out interesting details, informing us of important facts and telling us what he liked about each of the different exhibits. He truly made our museum stay much fuller and enjoyable than it would have been without him.

Such hospitality is so unusual that people can’t help but being suspicious. Some neighbors complained that they were running a B&B and are trying to have them zoned out. Others have asked them why they’re not afraid of having complete strangers in their home overnight. We ourselves (not yet knowing them and with little faith in the state of general humanity) kept asking ourselves when the “catch” was going to show up. It never did.

Frank and Sue are genuine Christians who love the Lord and are passionate about all they do. They practice eccentric hospitality. But only because “normal” has been so terribly skewed.

It’s worth visiting the Creation Museum just to stay at Troy’s Creation House. We highly recommend them.

Thank you, Frank and Sue.