It might be not be what you think, but slip ups in this area can mess up your effectiveness very quickly. It falls in the area of not being trusted. As people of prayer we are often entrusted with information that is confidential in nature. In my work of ministering to pastors it happens all the time. This is for a couple of reasons:
1. People will trust you with things if they know you will pray for it.
People who know that you are a person of prayer will give you information about their needs. They are looking for someone they know will not just say they will pray about it, but who will actually pray about the need. But if word gets out that you can’t be trusted with that information, because you are going to blab it to everyone, you may miss some prayer assignments that God wanted you to pray.
2. God will trust you with things He knows you will talk to Him about.
God will bring into His confidence people who He is confident that He can share His heart. He told Abraham, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?” (Gen 18:17) A prayer that I pray often is, “God reveal your secrets to me.” But God is looking to see if I can handle the information that He shares in an appropriate manner. We need to practice in being trusted.
A pastor that had a great prayer team around him had one main qualification to be on the team. Anyone on his personal prayer team must not, “be given to sins of the tongue.” Is this an area that you need to strengthen to go to the next exciting level that God would have for you in your ministry of prayer?