I'd be happy if he didn't do any homages at all. We had enough of that in the prequels, like Anakin and Obi-Wan walking into that bar on Coruscant.
The only connective tissue I really care about is the style of the filmmaking itself. We already know this will be shot in the same format as the OT, but I hope Abrams and Mindel are able to make it fit with the overall aesthetic established in those movies.