Rob Bradshaw posted two articles of interest to students of the book of Acts at Biblical Studies.org.uk. Steve Walton (London School of Theology) wrote two articles in The Evangelical Quarterly on Acts, both are reproduced by permission of the current copyright holder. You may download the PDF to your own computer for offline reading or send a copy to your Kindle or iPad with the Kindle App. to save these links to your computer, right-click and select “save as.”
Steve Walton, “The Acts – of God? What is the ‘Acts of the Apostles’ all about?” The Evangelical Quarterly 80.4 (October 2008): 291-306. Walton argues that the central theme of the book of Acts is not Paul or Mission as is often suggested, but rather God. In order to make this point, he uses a statistical analysis of the book and shows that God (or Lord) is used as the subject of verbs more often than any other noun. He draws a number of implications from this observation with respect to using Acts for doctrine and mission.
Steve Walton, “Primitive Communism in Acts? Does Acts Present the Community of Goods (2:44-45; 4:32-35) as Mistaken?” The Evangelical Quarterly 80.2 (April 2008): 99-111. Some scholars have suggested that Luke has a negative view of the the earliest believers in Jerusalem who “held all things in common.” Since the practice is not mentioned later in the book, is it thought that the practice was given up for a variety of reasons. Walton disagrees with several of the more “negative” views of this common ownership and also draws some distinctions between the practice in Acts and Qumran. In the end he thinks that the question, “does Luke have a negative view of the practice” is wrong-headed, the practice was not a sharing of all property in the first place, and the practice does not disappear later in Acts. Sharing with those in need is in fact a Christian practice everywhere (2 Cor 8:13-15).
If you do not know about BiblicalStudies.org.uk, you ought to at least bookmark their new additions page. Rob Bradshaw provides a vast array of scholarship on both theology and biblical studies.