Interview with Prof. Steve Walton
In anticipation of the KEDS Spring Research Seminar, we spoke with Prof. Steve Walton about his forthcoming presentation.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and describe your main area of work or research?
I’m a New Testament scholar who is Senior Research Fellow at Trinity College, Bristol, primarily involved in our PhD programme. I’ve worked especially on Luke-Acts over the last 30 years, and am in process of writing the Word Biblical Commentary on Acts—volume 1 appeared in November 2024.
What will your session focus on?
I’m going to look at ‘The Book of Acts—Whose Acts’, focusing on the primary actor(s) in the book. It’s not the answer most commentators and scholars would give until rather recently.
What first sparked your interest in this topic or area of study?
I wrote an essay for Charlie (C. F. D.) Moule during my first term at theological college in Cambridge on ‘The main theological themes of Luke’ and in doing so discovered there was a major debate over the portrait of Paul in Acts, whether it fits with the portrait derived from Paul’s letters. That sparked my interest in Acts and led to a PhD on the Miletus speech (Acts 20:18-36).
Why do you think this topic matters to the church, the academy, or the wider world today?
Our approaches to Acts (and other biblical books) are all too human and we fail to look for the way God works. For instance, people try to construct models for church-planting from Acts and adopt a naive ‘how to’ approach which neglects the work of God in planting churches.
What question, idea, or problem has most shaped your work in this area so far?
Understanding the book of Acts itself, rather than the way people have ‘always’ read it.
How has your research or practice changed the way you think, teach, or minister?
It’s made me think carefully about the whole New Testament from a divine perspective; as a result I co-founded a seminar in the international Society for New Testament Studies on ‘God in the New Testament’, to investigate this forgotten topic.
What is the one insight from your work that you hope others will find helpful or challenging?
From a Christian perspective, that we need to study Scripture on our knees, in dependence on God. From a scholarly perspective, that we need to keep the focus on God, God’s character, and what God does.
Thank you for your time, Prof. Walton! You can sign up for Prof. Walton’s presentation on Monday, 30 March 2026, via Eventbrite.
You can read more about Prof Walton’s work by clicking here.
