26 Quotes by Philip Graham Ryken

Why does God call people to be artists? Because he is an Artist, and we are made in his image. When we first meet the God of the Bible, he is busy making things and calling them good. Thus it is only natural for him to take some of the people that he has made, call them to be artists, and hold them to an aesthetic standard.

The Christian worldview is liturgical as well as cerebral; it culminates with an everlasting crescendo of praise.

Art has tremendous power to shape culture and touch the human heart. Its artifacts embody the ideas and desires of the coming generation. This means that what is happening in the arts today is prophetic of what will happen in our culture tomorrow. It also means that when Christians abandon the artistic community, we lose a significant opportunity to coniniu- nicate Christ to our culture.

When a mind is in love with Jesus, this is what it sees: a world full of the wonders he has made.

God has high standard for art, and obviously he does not and cannot endorse the content of work that is pornographic or propagandistic, or that violates his character in some other way.

Rather than giving in to meaninglessness and despair, Christian artists know that there is a way out. Thus they create images of grace, awakening a desire for the new heavens and the new earth by anticipating the possibilities of redemption in Christ.

The true sons of Abraham are not identified biologically, but Christologically.

At its best, art is able to do what Fujimura’s paintings do: satisfy our deep longing for beauty and communicate profound spiritual, intellectual, and emotional truth about the world that God has made for his glory. Is it any wonder that the best artists are celebrated?