Believer as Sacrament? (Amos Yong part II)

Still working my way through Amos Yong's book. One of the interesting things I'm finding is how much theology has been written by Pentecostals. A lot of it is just passed over by mainline theologians. Yong's book, and this book, have pointed me to some texts to start with (Yong gives an interesting defense of "Oneness" Pentecostalism in the book as well).

The book, as I suggested in an earlier post, is basically a summary of the ways in which those Yong terms "Classical Pentecostal" groups (Protestant pentecostal denominations not part of other groups, like Assemblies of God) can relate to ecumenical dialogue.

Particularly interesting to me for ecumenical dialogue is Yong's account of Pentecostal "sacramentality." Rather than seeing God's grace as mediated through sacraments or a special priesthood, Yong shows that Pentecostals see what might be called a kind of experiential and incarnational "sacramentality" in the role of believers in a church. Pentecostal congregations are constituted by the action of the Holy Spirit to form a community through the gifts of tongues, healing, evangelism, and so on. There is what we might call a "mediation" of grace through the Spirit's presence in the actions of the congregation. Yong says the Spirit is encountered "tangibly" through the embodied experiences of the community of saints.