S2E6 - Don’t Hurt People: A Lesson Learned the Hard Way—War, Prison, and Divine Grace with Jack Hager

Jack Hager joins Jeff Ellison for a raw, wide-ranging conversation tracing his journey from a transient military childhood and early addiction, to combat in Vietnam, involvement in smuggling and organized crime, and a 10-year prison sentence. In a Texas jail cell—through boredom, books, and an unexpected encounter with the Gospels—Jack experiences a faith conversion that reshapes his worldview and sets him on a decades-long path of prison ministry.

Along the way, Jack returns again and again to personal responsibility: “You make your choices, then your choices make you.” The episode explores war’s moral complexity, the scars...