We Are Willing — An Adoption Story

When Megan Bates Hunt was fourteen years old, she wrote a prayer on a post-it note: “Lord, let me be a foster parent.” Little did she know, God would abundantly fulfill this desire and give her a family that would mirror His heart. 

Megan, also known as “Victory,” was a Pine Cove staffer for years. After her first summer as a Ranch counselor and ropes course instructor, she worked as the Langemeiers’ nanny for four summers, gaining valuable marriage and parenting wisdom simply by living in Carrie and Craig’s home. 

After five years of impactful summers, Megan wondered what was next. How, in her post-college life, would she commit her way to the Lord and serve Him with the same fervor? When she was twenty-three and working as a schoolteacher, the Lord brought to mind her post-it note prayer, rekindling her desire to be a foster parent. Without knowing how or if foster parenting was a possibility for her, she began the application process and prayed every step of the way. Meanwhile, Megan wasn’t married and didn’t know any other single foster moms, but as she prayed, God left hints like breadcrumbs before her. From her roommate unexpectedly moving out of their two-bedroom apartment to her landlord allowing her to pay the rent of a one-bedroom, the door of opportunity kept swinging wider. As the logistics began to fall into place, Megan prayed over her new spare bedroom, asking the Lord to bring along whoever He wanted to fill it. 

A week after turning twenty-four, Megan received her first foster placement—an eight-year-old girl named Anna. Anna had significant health issues and Megan experienced first-hand the extreme difficulties that come with foster parenting. But even with its challenges, Megan knew this was what she was called to do. When her next placement, three-year-old Christian, left to live with a relative, Megan was heartbroken and knew she wanted her next placement to be a baby. Soon afterward, seven-month-old Cooper arrived. Cooper had been abandoned in a snowstorm and came to Megan with significant health issues and trauma. She wasn’t planning to adopt, but when no family members could provide long-term care for Cooper, Megan asked the Lord if He was leading her to take another huge step of faith. In 2010, when Cooper was two and a half years old, he became her son. Through every step of fostering and adopting, Megan practiced saying yes and trusting God, even if it meant living a life that looked like no one else’s.

She and Cooper moved to Houston to be closer to her parents, and Megan began adjusting to life as a single mom. For years, Megan had been single. Her friends even nicknamed her the One-Date-Wonder because she went on so many first dates that she decided weren’t right for her. The One-Date-Wonder certainly desired marriage, but she knew she needed someone to commit to both her and Cooper. Meanwhile, Logan Hunt heard Megan and Cooper’s adoption story from a friend. He was so moved by Megan’s bravery and faith that he began to regularly pray for her and her new son—and after seeing a photo of Megan on a Christmas card, he was moved to do more than that! It didn’t take long before they were set up on a blind date, and just one month later, Megan and Logan were engaged. They immediately became a family of three, and in just four years, added three biological children to the mix: Carlisle, Elizabeth, and Catterson.

But their expanding family story has not been without heartache. In the past year, Megan and Logan suffered three separate miscarriages. Their two sons, John Allen and Wells, were both lost at sixteen weeks, and daughter, Charlotte, at nineteen weeks. “We were broken but open handed,” says Megan. Even amid confusion and pain, the Hunts wanted their family to be an expression of worship. So they prayed, they mourned, and somehow, they kept going.

In the midst of this grief, Megan saw a post on Facebook about a boy waiting to be adopted in China. In two months, he would turn fourteen years old and age out of the orphanage without hope of a family, job, or higher education.

“I took a screenshot of the post and immediately began praying, ‘Lord, where is his mom? Lord, find his mom.’ Little did I know, it was me!” Megan exclaimed. 

She presented the situation to Logan and, together, they decided to take another huge leap of faith and pursue his adoption. Jumping into an international adoption is already risky business, and the odds were doubly stacked against them. In China, the adopted child is supposed to be the youngest in the adoptive family, but if the Hunts adopted this boy, he would be the oldest. Also, the adoptive family isn’t supposed to have a child under the age of three, and Catterson was only fifteen months old. In order to adopt under these circumstances, China would have to issue a waiver—something that only happens in rare cases. On top of that, international adoptions typically take eighteen months, and they only had seven weeks. An impossible situation. But Megan and Logan prayed, and again, God flung open the doors. 

It was clear that there was no one else pursuing adoption for this child, no one but Megan and Logan. So in March of 2019, after seven weeks—a timeline that is unheard of in international adoptions—Ethan Joseph Hunt came home. 

“And what a picture of the Gospel it is,” Megan says. “For the forgotten and fatherless to be welcomed into a family.” 

Adjusting to adoption isn’t easy. Everyone in the Hunt family has had to adapt to a new way of life. Especially Ethan, who is learning English, getting used to new food, assimilating into a new culture, and learning how to live in a family. But Megan has gotten to see her new son be so brave as he lives with new siblings, goes to a new school, and restarts his life in a brand-new place. They’ve even been able to study the Bible together through Bible Study Fellowship’s Chinese resources. “Having Ethan has changed what we think about family, and has given us a new hunger for living and teaching the Gospel,” says Megan. “We’re constantly unfolding clenched fists, but we are willing.” 

According to Megan, living out the Gospel is rarely pretty or glamorous. Most of the time, it’s downright hard and uncomfortable. “But just because a Gospel opportunity doesn’t feel good,” Megan reassures, “doesn’t mean it’s not good. The Gospel is uncomfortable at times, but when I look into God’s Word, it’s plain as day that taking care of orphans is what He wants us to do.” 

Megan and Logan will tell you that they are not superheroes. They are an ordinary family living through tragedy and celebration one day at a time. But they’ve allowed the glory of God to shatter their ordinary lives and the richness of redemption to be written into their family’s story. It may not be free of hardship, but it is worth far more than they could imagine.