Quotes from Henry R Van Til

Since man is a moral being, his culture cannot be a-moral. Because man is a religious being, his culture, too, must be religiously oriented.

Although the realization of values in a culture may seem on the surface to be concerned merely with the temporal and material, this is appearance only, for man is a spiritual being destined for eternity, exhaustively accountable to his Creator-Lord.

Culture is any and all human effort and labor expended upon the cosmos, to unearth its treasures and its riches and bring them into the service of man for the enrichment of human existence unto the glory of God.

The expectation of future glory and the joy of future redemption has its counterpart here and now in the implications for the present life of the believer.

Christians are called unto holiness and are to be engaged actively in self-purification. They are to walk in good works which have been prepared before, unto which they have been called. But how is it possible to visualize this activity of believers outside of their culture? Is holiness restricted to the life of the soul?

Rome changed the New Testament catholicity (which purifies and sanctifies as it's proper domain the whole of life) and has substituted in its place a dualism which separates the supernatural from the natural.

The Protestant Reformation did not merely seek to cleanse the church and deliver it from doctrinal errors, but it also sought the restoration of the whole of life.

Through the Reformation, the mechanical relation of nature and grace was superceded by an ethical one, so that the restoration of the law of God in every sphere of life became the concern of the believer.

Christ has redeemed the cultural agents, thus transforming culture also.

Sin has not destroyed the creaturely relationship of man to his maker, who made him a cultural creature with the mandate to replenish and subdue the earth. Sin has not destroyed the cultural urge in man to rule, since man is an image-bearer of the Ruler of heaven and earth. Neither has sin destroyed the cosmos, which is man's workshop. Culture then, is a must for God's image bearers, but it will be either a demonstration of faith or apostasy, either a God-glorifying or a God-defying culture.