Acts of the Apostles

Osvaldo Padilla is Associate professor of New Testament at Beeson Divinity School, Birmingham, Alabama. Author of The Speeches of Outsiders in Acts: Poetics, Theology, and Historiography, and articles and reviews for Themelios, Bulletin for Biblical Research, New Testament Studies and Ex Auditu. Previously taught New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and served as pastor of Jesus el Buen Pastor, a Hispanic congregation in the Chicago area.

This study of the book of Acts presents Luke not only as author but also as exemplaryhistorian, storyteller and theologian. Luke’s three-stranded cord of authorial discourse is on conspicuous display in his composition of Peter’s, Stephen’s, Philip’s and Paul’s speeches. Where other textbooks often focus on the narratives in Acts (e.g. Pentecost) and the practices of the early church, Padilla highlights the speeches in Acts and their continuing significance, going beyond the call of New Testament duty by dialoguing with postliberal theologians and asking whether they can do justice to the speeches in Acts and in particular their truth claims. The result is an introductory text that not only illumines the book of Acts, but also encourages Christians today to "act out the acts of the apostles! (John Donne), to speak out their speech acts.