ABSTRACT
For Von Allmen the Bible is the source of all authentic preaching, and the role of the Bible in the preaching of the Church is as a dynamic, event-provoking presence. Preaching cannot claim to be biblical simply because it gums together a lot of biblical quotes, like peanuts in a Snickers bar. One impact of the use of redaction criticism is the tendency among preachers to respect the canonical form of a biblical text, that is to say, the way the passage comes to people in the Bible. Preachers are being increasingly exposed to biblical commentaries and other resources which make it abundantly clear that the Bible was not written in a theological think tank but by people whose faces were weathered by the economic, political, and social climate of their day. Contemporary understandings of the task of preaching share Von Allmen's high view of the congregation's place in the preaching event.
