All week long we have been joined by pastor and author Tim Keller. He has a wonderful new book coming out soon, Prayer Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God is the title. It releases on November 4th and he joins us once more from New York City to finish out the week.

Okay, Dr. Keller, we near the finish line here with question number nine. In passages like James chapter 4, verse 3, we are told there's a type of prayer that doesn't work. It's an idol-centered prayer, it's asking for something with wrong motives. Can you explain this? What type of prayer doesn't work?

Well, yes, when James talks about prayers that, where you're asking for something selfishly or just to spend on your own selfish desires, I would say that there's, that's a sub, put it this way, that would be a subheading under even a bigger heading. God's not going to give you something that's bad for you.

See, if he's your father, he's not going to give you something that's bad for you. Just like I as a father wouldn't give my children something they ask for if they don't realize it would not be safe, they'd probably hurt themselves. So you know, J.I. Packer in his book on prayer actually says that ultimately there's no such thing as unanswered prayer.

And even John Calvin says God grants our prayer even if he does not always respond to the exact form of our request. That's a pretty amazing thing for John Calvin to say. God grants our prayer even if it does, he does not always respond to the exact form of the request.

So what Packer and Calvin are saying is that we might ask for something that's just not good for us. And God being a good father tries to give us what we would have asked for if we, if we knew everything he knew or try to give us what we're after, even though he won't give it to us in the form that we asked for it.

Now that's the general heading of things that he won't give us, things that are bad for us. But inside there are some things that we're asking for with very bad motives. We don't know about it at the time, they're very selfish or very proud or very, or maybe there are things that assume a very overblown assessment of our own gifts.

And those things that are actually badly motivated, God particularly can't give us because that would just fuel that pride. And so I would say that's a subheading, it's something that's not good for us. Now you could ask for something that's not good for you with the best of motives.

You're not being selfish, it's not idle, it's not idol-driven, it's just unwise and he's not going to give it to you. But then the idol-driven kinds of requests would even be worse and he just simply won't do it. So that's what I think that means. >> Very good. And we finally arrive at the last question of the week, question number 10.

Of course there are a lot of books on prayer and some very good ones too. So what do you think will surprise readers about your book or what do you think makes your book on prayer unique? >> I'll give you three and I'm not sure that, I think people will probably come away with at least one of these three.

One is it's a more comprehensive book. The reason I wrote it was because there's a lot of great books on prayer, but books on prayer either go into the theology of prayer or they go into the practice of prayer or they troubleshoot it and they say here's problems. And I felt I didn't have one book I could give to people that was basically covering all the bases.

You know, here's the biblical view of prayer, the theology of prayer, and here are some methods of prayer. I didn't have a good first book just to give somebody. So some people might come away and say what's unique about it is it's sort of balanced and kind of comprehensive but not too long.

The second thing that might be surprising, I think, is on the one hand I really go deeply into John Owen's stuff in his book, not only his book on prayer, The Role of the Holy Spirit in Prayer, but also his book on the grace and duty of being spiritually minded.

John Owen is very mystical. He really believes that you can have a faith sight of Jesus Christ, really see the glory of God, not with your physical eyes but with the eyes of the heart. And he actually says your affections have to be involved, there needs to be deep, deep, deep joy in prayer.

So he's very, very mystical in that sense. But at the same time he's very down on Catholic mysticism and a lot of, he would be very down on an awful lot of the ways in which evangelicals are trying to bring in Catholic contemplative prayer practices. And I think that's what's unusual about the book.

Because most books I know that are critical, as I am, of contemplative prayer, and I am, then do not turn around and try to give you a really robustly Reformed and Protestant approach to affectionate prayer, affection and meditation. So I think Luther, Edwards, and John Owen give you that.

But many people who are trying to get away from the contemplative prayer practices are afraid of talking about meditation at all, and they're afraid of talking about deep experiences and encounters with God. They're just afraid to go there. And what I try to do is I try to say, "No, we've really got to get there.

We have to get there. And these guys are good guides, Owen, Edwards, Luther." But at the same time we need to be pretty critical of a lot of the contemplative prayer practices that are being brought into the church right now. That's what I think a lot of people probably find pretty interesting.

I think probably the third reason is, in the end, it's pretty practical. And I do find an awful lot of books are afraid of actually saying, "Here's a way to actually spend 15, 20 minutes in prayer." I actually try to get pretty practical at the end. I think some people would expect a Reformed evangelical type to be a little bit more, "Here's the exegesis, and now you go and apply it for yourself." Well, the book is surprisingly practical and comprehensive.

You have accomplished something really remarkable in this book. Thank you for your time, Dr. Keller. That was Tim Keller, author of the new book titled, "Prayer, Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God." It releases on November 4th, and you should seriously consider getting this book and reading it and perhaps even reading it together with a friend or a group of friends.

I suspect this book is going to mark a turning point in the prayer lives of a lot of Christians this fall and this winter. I'm still putting together my list of Christian books of the year, but I think this one may finish at the top. It's that good. And this has been a really fun week talking about prayer with Tim Keller.

And today on the DG blog, I published a full transcript of our time together. It's titled, "10 Questions on Prayer with Tim Keller." Go to DesiringGod.org to read it or Google the title, "10 Questions on Prayer with Tim Keller." And if you missed any of the episodes this week, all five of them are embedded in the bottom of that post.

And speaking of reading the Bible, we'll be back on Monday with Pastor John and a question from a listener who has really never read the Bible for themselves. Where should he start? I'm your host, Tony Reinke. We'll see you on Monday. Thank you for watching. God bless. 1. What is the Bible?

2. What is the Bible? 3. What is the Bible? 4. What is the Bible? 5. What is the Bible? 6. What is the Bible? 7. What is the Bible? 8. What is the Bible? 9. What is the Bible?