Ping
I know my old profs at RTS very much teach the above about a physical temple, and it is classical Reformed theology.
However, even if there is no NEED for a physical temple now, does that preclude one being built anyway?
Obviously Orthodox Jews (mostly) would like a rebuilt temple, and, even though we as Christians would agree any sacrifices done there would be for nothing (since Jesus is the final sin-offering)—and worship of God, without worship of Christ now is actually blasphemous...still, IF it happened, would that throw a brick through classical amillennial eschatology?
Obviously, in the same theology, there’s no “need” for a reconstituted Israel either—(or even, in more extreme versions of the continuation of Jews as a distinct people) and yet, there she is...(as yet secular, and unbelieving as she indeed still is).
The rebirth of Israel is, after all, one reason I think, dispensational eschatology has become so dominant in evangelical circles.
While I accept the central premise of ultimately one people of God, not 2...and that our current age is not merely a parentheses of God dealing with ethnic Israel, rather the culmination of God’s purposes in redemptive history, I have to consider—given Romans 11 and elsewhere there is a special place in God’s heart for the blood descendants of Abraham—even as they too must come to believe in the Messiah—of all nations.