Quotes from Henry R. Van Til

The family is the simplest and smallest unit of society and the real fountain of culture. If this fountain remains pure, man's culture has promise. But if it becomes polluted, all the rest will turn to dust and ashes, since the home is the foundation of the entire social structure.

Culture derives its meaning from man's faith in God; it is never an end in itself, but always a means of expressing one's religious faith.

Scripture is not only the authoritative guide for the way of salvation, but it furnishes man with an authoritative interpretation of reality as a whole.

In his separation from God in whose light alone man can see the truth, man lost his catholicizing spirit- he no longer (apart from regeneration) is able to see the meaning in life and view it as a whole. His culture was fragmentized. Man sees only a part reality, but he does not see its relation as a whole, nor does he ascend from the creature to the Creator. In his apostasy, man has fallen in love with the cosmos or some aspect of reality, and he worships the creation instead of the Creator.

The Christian is in the world, but not to be of it. This constitutes the basis of the perennial problem involved in the discussion of Christian culture. Because believers are not of the world, there have been many Christians who have taken a negative attitude toward culture.

Culture is "lived religion". It is the form that religion takes in the lives of men.

The problem of living a Christian life in a non-Christian society is pressing, since most of our social institutions are non-Christian and in pagan hands. The family remains the only trustworthy transmitter of Christian culture.

One cannot keep on evangelizing the world without interfering with the world's culture. It devolves upon God's people, therefore, to contend for such a society which will give the maximum opportunity for us to live wholly Christian lives and the maximum opportunity for others to become Christians.

The primary principle of the Calvinistic system of thought is the direct and absolute sovereignty of God over all things. Such sovereignty is not one among the many attributes of God, but it comes to expression in all of His attributes.

Religion based on divine sovereignty is religion for God's sake. Religion is for God, for whom all things exist. Whereas all forms of Arminianistic Christianity make man the final arbiter of his own salvation, in Calvinism, God saves sovereignly, immediately, whom He wills.

A biblical metaphysics implies a biblical theory of knowledge and a biblical ethic.

Calvinism furnishes us with the only theology of culture that is truly relevant for the world in which we live, because it is the true theology of the Word.

Culture is a sacred activity, an exercise in the sphere of religion.

Religious faith always transcends culture, and is the integrating principle and power of man's cultural striving.

To divide life into areas of sacred and secular, letting our devotions take care of the former while becoming secular reformers during the week, is to fail to understand the true end of man

David was so filled with ecstasy at this glory-filled vocation (of the creation mandate) that he exclaimed in awe and wonder, "What is man that Thou art mindful of him?... For Thou hast made him a little lower than God, and crownest him with glory and honor... Thou hast put all things under his feet." To say that culture is man's calling in the covenant is only another way of saying that culture is religiously determined.

Culture is not a peripheral concern, but the of the very essence of life. It is an expression of man's essential being as created in the image of God. Since mans is essentially a religious being, culture is expressive of his relationship to God, that is, of his religion.

The directive to "fill the earth" (Gen. 1:28) is not primarily a reproductive command. The "filling" of the earth is a cuh«re/activity.