Why Praying for the Nations Changes Everything - Kyle Eipperle, Operation World

What if the simplest, most overlooked act in your faith could shape nations, strengthen your family, and even change your life’s direction?

In this episode of Entrusting the Faith, Eric Rutherford sits down with missionary and Operation World researcher Kyle Eipperle to unpack the power of prayer, global missions, and raising families with a vision far beyond their home.

After nearly 20 years serving in Ukraine, Kyle shares how God redirected his mission back to the U.S., not to slow down, but to multiply impact through one of the most influential global prayer resources in the world.

This conversation will challenge how you think about prayer, expose the spiritual realities most people never see, and equip you to lead your family with purpose.

Highlights:

•  The surprising origin story of Operation World and how it grew into a global movement 
•  What an “unreached people group” really means and why it matters more than you think 
•  Why prayer, not strategy, has always been the foundation of global missions 
•  How entire political systems have shifted because believers prayed 
•  The hidden spiritual battles happening in countries you rarely hear about 
•  How to disciple your kids with a global, gospel-centered worldview 
•  Real stories of people who started praying… and ended up becoming missionaries 

Why This Episode Matters:
Most Christians never think beyond their immediate world. This episode expands your vision.

You’ll walk away with a deeper understanding of global missions, a renewed conviction about the power of prayer, and practical ways to lead your family spiritually, starting at the kitchen table.

Bottom Line:
If you want to grow in faith, lead your family well, and understand your role in God’s global mission, this episode will open your eyes in ways you didn’t expect.

https://operationworld.org/

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Transcript

Eric Rutherford (00:00)
Welcome to the Entrusting the Faith podcast. I'm your host, Eric Rutherford, and I am thrilled today because I have with me Kyle Epperly. He is a researcher with Operation World and a longtime missionary who spent nearly 20 years serving in the Ukraine, alongside developing resources focused on unreached people groups across Europe and Asia. Kyle and his wife, Carrie, faithfully raised and discipled their eight children, whom they've homeschooled from the beginning. They've been married for 30 years.

with, and their lives just been marked by deep commitment to family, discipleship, and global missions. Kyle, welcome to the show.

KYLE EIPPERLE (00:33)
Yeah, thank you. Glad to be here.

Eric Rutherford (00:35)
It's my pleasure and I'm thrilled because, you know, I've used Operation World now for... The math on that starts getting a little, you know, well over 20 years. You know, use it with our kids and so, I think it's an amazing resource and just want to make people who aren't aware of it, kind of expose them to it and just give them some...

some background on it. So thanks for joining me.

So.

Let's just start for people who are unfamiliar with Operation World. What is it?

KYLE EIPPERLE (01:08)
huh.

Right. Well, most people who know it know of the book. The book is now in its eighth edition. It began in 1964 in a part of Africa, which was known as Rhodesia at the time, now in the southern part of Africa, and developed by Patrick Johnstone, who was a missionary.

Eric Rutherford (01:17)
Wow.

KYLE EIPPERLE (01:35)
And the first publication he did, like the first edition of Operation World, was just a 32 pages of a few regions of the world to help them help the church pray for the nations. And it's much bigger now. It's over a thousand pages.

My book has kind of crumbled and fallen apart because it's such a large book, but it covers every country of the world. And how can Christians pray? How can Christians pray for the nations? it provides statistical data, prayer points, and information about how we can pray for that particular country.

Eric Rutherford (02:15)
I didn't realize it has been around for that long. ⁓

KYLE EIPPERLE (02:19)
Yeah, 60 years. We're

celebrating 60 years now.

Eric Rutherford (02:23)
Wow. So the eighth edition of it. I don't know if I've... I think at one point in time, I had a paper copy for the last 10 plus years I know when I've been using it. I've been on the email list or I've been using the app, which is really a great tool. And so it has every country in the world.

KYLE EIPPERLE (02:38)
The app.

Eric Rutherford (02:45)
all the statistics. So how did you get involved with Operation World?

KYLE EIPPERLE (02:51)
Right, well I was in my last term in Ukraine, 2017-2018, and that's when our oldest daughter was turning 18. She was born in 2000, so she ⁓ had a decision to make, and we had a decision to make, because children who are 18 cannot stay in the country.

and stay with the family. They need their own visa. In order to get a visa, you'd have to become a missionary. So she had no plans for that. So we decided as a family to return to the States with her. we have, at the time, had seven children. And there would be the next one that would...

would be going through the same process of transitioning from Ukraine and back into the United States. We wanted to continue discipling our children and helping them in their life. Who are they going to be and what are they going to do? How do you live in a country you've never lived in? How do you even function? They don't have a driver's license. They don't have

any bank account, they don't have really anything in America for them to begin their lives. So we saw this as a new phase, a new journey, I guess, for the entire family.

Eric Rutherford (04:10)
That's amazing that the door opened up, you're able to do that. I know, because that has to be incredible. It's stressful trying to figure out how to best help your children in that respect.

KYLE EIPPERLE (04:24)
All right. And ⁓ so we wonder what are we going to do? know, the nations have not been reached. I'm not just going to stop doing missions. Some of the work we were doing in Ukraine was mobilizing Ukrainians to be missionaries and training and mobilizing and helping to get them to go out.

Eric Rutherford (04:37)
Mmm.

KYLE EIPPERLE (04:43)
outside their country to the nations. And we actually did see that happen. And one of the ministries had many... I did everything. I did everything from student ministries to camping ministries to preaching ministries and teaching at seminaries and Bible colleges in Ukraine. But the passion really was this missions mobilization.

to see a church that was receiving missionaries, sending out missionaries. so one of my ministries was creating prayer guides for the unreached people groups of Russia and Ukraine and Central Asia, places where Ukrainian would go as missionaries. And I loved doing that. And I thought maybe I would continue doing that even

Eric Rutherford (05:15)
you

KYLE EIPPERLE (05:28)
with our organization in the states, but they didn't see a need or a vision to have that kind of ministry. But someone in our organization knew Jason, the author of Operation World. And Operation World was looking for someone. They sent out requests to organizations as to the type of people.

that they're looking for. And they thought of me. My leadership thought of Kyle. There's Kyle. He does this. He does this research on the nations of the world. And it all began with that. And I had some conversations with the leadership of Operation World. And it fell right into place, right when we were

needing a new ministry here in the States in 2019. And yeah, God really provided for us.

Eric Rutherford (06:18)
That is wonderful to hear. I want to get into kind of what you do as a researcher, but before we do that, let me ask. So I know what an unreached people group is, but some of our listeners might not. Would you kind of describe what that is for those who may not know that term?

KYLE EIPPERLE (06:28)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Sure. There's many terms that are used, unreached or least reached or just lost or hidden peoples. Joshua Project is probably the group that helps to define what unreached is. You take a percentage of a people group, an ethno-

linguistic people group that have the same language, culture. They're probably in the same country. And unreached is anything below 2 % Christian. If there's an evangelical Christian church with more than 2%, they kind of move up into the reached category that they do have enough believers.

within that community in order to reach the community. yeah, anything above 2 % Christian reached below 2 % would be unreached.

Eric Rutherford (07:37)
So below 2 % is kind of that cutoff which defines it as unreached.

KYLE EIPPERLE (07:42)
We just say unreached,

but the full definition is they are unreached with the gospel.

Eric Rutherford (07:48)
are unreached with the gospel. So that means very low percentage of believers and very little access to the gospel, it sounds like. Man. So as a researcher, what's that job look like? how do you contribute and make Operation World and continue to improve upon it and make it the resource that it is?

KYLE EIPPERLE (07:58)
Right, exactly.

Yeah, well the thing about all of the, you know, versions, editions of Operation World, the last one which was published was in 2010. If your copy of Operation World is orange and blue, that is the seventh edition of Operation World and that's already 16 years.

That's already 16 years ago. And there are countries that have came to be since 2010. There was no South Sudan at the time. There are some countries that have changed their name. The thing is, when we start to write, usually by the time it's published and out into the people, it's already starting to get...

It started getting outdated and we wish we could wish we could just you know Wave our hands and say everybody stop, please do not Change you know, no wars, please no, no but it's it's a world of it's a changing world and The wonderful thing about the app is we can

we can update that. We update that every year when there's significant change in a country. Every year we update the app. So that is if you want current prayer points and things to pray for the nations, the app currently is the most up to date. So what we do is we read a lot.

Eric Rutherford (09:23)
Okay.

KYLE EIPPERLE (09:40)
We read a lot, we search a lot, we read from mission organizations and churches, whatever ⁓ news from whatever country. Luckily we are a global team. have people in Korea, in Germany, in the UK, in Canada, in the US.

Africa as well. So we have quite a wide range of workers on our team that can really, really opens up a lot when you have people who are from Asia, Africa, Europe, North America. It helps in reading. I speak Russian and Ukrainian. I can read.

Eric Rutherford (10:15)
Mm-hmm.

KYLE EIPPERLE (10:18)
those languages, ⁓ they're very thankful that they have somebody who could get into some of these details that ⁓ an English speaker would not be able to. So we continue just collating and collecting information, something that never stops. So we're in the writing process right now.

And hopefully soon in ⁓ a few years, there'll be a new book.

Eric Rutherford (10:41)
That's excellent. That's excellent. so...

As a prayer guide, I know you mentioned that one of the ways the operation world really serves believers around the world, what else makes it such an important resource for believers?

KYLE EIPPERLE (10:48)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Some people just use it as an encyclopedia just for information, but the goal is that people would pray. know, prayer is an essential part of missions. It's, I would say it's in the DNA of the Bible. You know, when Paul and Barnabas were...

were sent out as missionaries, the first missionary team. It happened during a prayer meeting. It happened while the church was praying and worshiping in Acts 13, we read. yeah, prayer is probably the goal and the work of missions. I love talking about this.

Eric Rutherford (11:39)
It is. And one of the things that I've really appreciated about Operation World is the detail you're able to go into with different people groups, different issues that are within a country, and really kind of being able to go very deep on some specifics that...

we don't read about online or on social media. And I think that we, especially in these United States, we are just blind to.

KYLE EIPPERLE (12:02)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, if it's not in the news, you know, it's not happening. And people don't know. People have never heard of some of these countries.

Eric Rutherford (12:16)
Yeah.

Yeah. Or the troubles that are going on there, especially for believers. Especially for believers. I think it just, it isn't reported in the mainstream. So what, I know in emails back and forth, I know you said you would use Operation World with your family. how have you, how were prior to...

KYLE EIPPERLE (12:24)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Eric Rutherford (12:43)
being a researcher there and now even as a researcher there with children in the home, how have you used Operation World with your family?

KYLE EIPPERLE (12:47)
All

Yeah,

I before I became a missionary, I worked at a Christian bookstore. I worked for family Christian stores back in the day. I remember my manager, the manager of the store said, Kyle, I was going to go off to Moody Bible Institute as as a student in their graduate program.

And he said, you're going to need some resources, some books. Pick out. I'll give you a you know, I'll give you a half price. And one of the books I got was Operation World. It was the 2001 edition of Operation World was one of, you you pick up a, you know, some commentaries and a dictionary and.

Concordance and things like this, but Operation World was one of those resources that I needed to have. And wanted to know about what is going on. Yeah, what is going on in Zimbabwe? What is going on in Afghanistan? And are there any Christians there? Really? Think of Iran right now. There's more than one million Christians in Iran.

Eric Rutherford (13:47)
Mm-hmm.

KYLE EIPPERLE (13:52)
And many of these people came to faith through Chinese missionaries. You know, people, it's difficult for us in North America to go there, but there are Christians from other countries as well sending missionaries. And how do we pray for, how do we pray for the Iranians? Today, how do we pray for them? You know? And so, yeah, that's what we want to do.

and how we've used it as a family. The first resource we've used with our children was Window on the World. It was part of, I think we were doing Sunlight Curriculum, and was part of the curriculum for homeschooling families, and we started using that. And what that is, is a very colorful and big

Eric Rutherford (14:20)
Mmm.

KYLE EIPPERLE (14:35)
publication for Sunday schools or with children. I'm an adult and I enjoy looking at it and reading it. There's usually a story about maybe one of the people groups that is covered. There are some facts in there and points on how to pray. And what we've always done is pray for.

Eric Rutherford (14:42)
yeah.

KYLE EIPPERLE (14:54)
for people, pray for the nations. That's what we would do and continue to do. Just recently, think in the last year, we were going through the app. Each day we'd pray for the country of the day. Operation World is like a calendar. If you have the book, you'll see on the bottom of the book, the days of the...

of the year and what we're praying for this day. something new each day to pray for.

Eric Rutherford (15:19)
I love that. I love, so we've, excuse me, we've used Window on the World. We use it with our kids. We use it as part of a curriculum when we taught, we taught sixth grade at a church for several years. And that was one of the things we always had our students go through at home, you know, with their families. It's just a phenomenal resource to learn and

pray for him and get exposure to and very engaging. If you're listening, I can't recommend that one enough, ⁓ especially with children. So yeah, we use that. We would, when my kids were younger, as part of our family worship time, I would get the globe and we would just, we didn't follow the days of the year. We just...

KYLE EIPPERLE (15:50)
Mm-hmm.

Thank you.

Eric Rutherford (16:05)
basically would, you know, I remember the first time we did it, I started in Japan, because it was, it was a great place to start. It's right there on the ocean. and just, you know, each day we would just move through the geography ⁓ and pray for things, given a summary from the app. It's, it's, love hearing how people use this information as a family.

KYLE EIPPERLE (16:20)
huh.

Eric Rutherford (16:31)
because I think this is, know, man, there are a few things that are more important, I think.

KYLE EIPPERLE (16:36)
All right, yeah, pray. I just remember in Matthew 9, Jesus said, pray for the harvest, pray for laborers. That was the strategy of missions that Jesus taught his disciples is to pray for the nations. And our kids enjoy doing it. We enjoy doing it.

They're learning. They learn a lot all about We have a map here on the wall and we go. Okay. Where is this place?

Eric Rutherford (16:56)
They do.

What do you think, because I...

Unfortunately, I don't think this is common, this idea of praying for the nations. And maybe it's just where I've been and what I've seen. do you think, is it a lack of awareness, a lack of not understanding the need, maybe an awareness of the resources available? I just love your take on what keeps this from

I don't know, why is this not more common than it is?

KYLE EIPPERLE (17:24)
Great.

Yeah, well prayer meetings, you know, aren't always the most popular thing in the church. You know, there used to be Sunday night or even Wednesday prayer meetings that were regular things the church did. And I think it's not just about praying for the nations, it's about praying, period. But...

Eric Rutherford (17:34)
No, they aren't.

KYLE EIPPERLE (17:48)
You know, as James wrote, know, prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. And I don't think we realize that power, that potential we have being on our knees, humbling ourselves and asking God. And he even says in his word, you know, pray for those in authority, pray for kings and...

and those in authority. And in every country there's somebody who's in authority and we should pray for them. So even the dictators, know, remember Nebuchadnezzar, know, pray for them and they will change. And prayer, the prayer of faith changes things.

And I remember just here in Ukraine hearing from the old believers, why did the ball come down? Why did the Soviet Union break up? They would say because of prayer. We prayed. We've been praying for years, decades about this, and God answered our prayers.

Eric Rutherford (18:49)
Wow. Wow, I'm just thinking about that now. It all comes down, what, 91? 90, 91? But, okay.

KYLE EIPPERLE (18:57)
Yeah, it's 80, 80, 89 things started changing,

perestroika and openness. And yeah, 91 is when the countries started becoming independent nations.

Eric Rutherford (19:13)
And I can only imagine having those conversations with those believers.

KYLE EIPPERLE (19:18)
Yeah, I learned a lot about prayer from them. They are powerful when they pray.

Eric Rutherford (19:22)
I don't

I can only imagine with being, you know, the former Soviet Union, very much, man, everything was clamped down and very much persecuted, but to pray with that kind of faith.

KYLE EIPPERLE (19:39)
end today with the war going on and and people continuing on faithfully and praying for the for its end.

Eric Rutherford (19:47)
That is, man, how much do we need that reminder that God answers prayer.

KYLE EIPPERLE (19:53)
Yeah.

He does.

Eric Rutherford (19:53)
He does.

What kind of impact have you seen Operation World actually have among churches and believers?

KYLE EIPPERLE (20:02)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, well we do have the info at email address. I don't know, maybe that's how you contacted us. ⁓

Eric Rutherford (20:13)
Actually, it is.

I had just dropped it in there and just to reach out.

KYLE EIPPERLE (20:17)
and

We'll hear from people with incredible testimonies how they were not interested in missions, but they got a hold of Operation World and started praying for a country. And lo and behold, a few years later, they end up as missionary in that country. We've gone to, you know,

Jason's gone to conferences, the global conferences, and people will come up to him and say how it impacted their, you know, was part of their calling. It was part of their calling and drawing them into missions. And what I found out is the more you learn about a place, the more you learn about a people,

the more you will be drawn to them. Wanting to know more, you you start getting curious, you want to know more. And before long, you found out that your address has changed. You have ended up in Ukraine. I don't know how I got to Ukraine, but it happened. People, yeah, more than once we've heard, we've heard this.

Eric Rutherford (21:01)
Yeah.

Mmm.

That is beautiful. I love that. I love what the Lord does through things like this to stir the hearts of His people.

KYLE EIPPERLE (21:32)
Right, yeah, praying to God about an ethnic group or a part of the world.

Eric Rutherford (21:37)
Yeah, it is amazing what the can and will do.

KYLE EIPPERLE (21:45)
Yeah.

Eric Rutherford (21:46)
as we kind of wrap up any kind of takeaways for the audience, whether it's encouragement, whether it's a challenge, anything you would kind of give to them as a send-all.

KYLE EIPPERLE (21:56)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, well, you can learn more about Operation World just by going to OperationWorld.org from the website. There's many, more resources. There is the app, which is, like I said before, it is the most up to date. And actually every week, every Wednesday morning for us here in ⁓

United States and you know Midwest United States every morning at eight o'clock we gather on zoom to pray for the the the people of the day and This is a global people from Asia people from Africa North and South America your people from all over the world come to this this prayer meeting And we can certainly get you to

know the address on Zoom as to how to join us in prayer for the nations. Perhaps you're already doing it home, but if you wanted to join others, and we usually have someone from that country telling us, what do you need and what does your country need? This past Wednesday, we prayed for ⁓

DRC, the Democratic Republic of Congo. And we had gathered with some another group in Africa of mission mission organization. had over ⁓ 30 people at that meeting. And every every I think every Wednesday is incredible.

thing. just, just through prayer and people humbling themselves. If you don't even know English, people pray in other languages. So, yeah, I hope that that people will use the prayer guide, the app, however, other resources that are found on the website. are resources that have been translated into 20 different languages.

There is, yeah, pretty much anything from bulletins for churches to do once a month that you can download. And there are PowerPoints with some of the prayer points that you could use at a church Bible study or prayer meeting. So, yeah.

Eric Rutherford (24:05)
Excellent. So if you're listening, OperationWorld.org, I'm going to drop that in the show notes as well. Check it out. Get informed and find out how we can pray for believers around the world and pray that God would move in powerful ways, in ways that only God can move.

KYLE EIPPERLE (24:09)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Eric Rutherford (24:31)
So Kyle, this has been a delightful conversation. I really appreciate you joining me today for all that you've shared.

KYLE EIPPERLE (24:37)
You're welcome, very much enjoyed it.

you