Please correct me if I am mistaken. The temple today is the body of the believer in the Church Age. The believer is indwelt by the Holy Spirit to provide a temple for the indwelling of Jesus Christ.
The soul is the battleground of temptation and our remaining in Him, it resides in our thinking and our volition. The filling of the Holy SPirit is the Spirit controlling our soul and reigning over our thinking, taking the gnosis or academic knowledge and thought and turning it into an epignosis or working knowledge which flows out of our self or our heart.
I've often considered why some who receive a physical mark of a beast would not receive salvation. God's sovereignty might declare anything except that which dpes against his essence. Surely it would seem that the Perfect Sacrifice was a far greater payment than any mark associated with commerce. But the mark is only identified to us as associated with the ability to buy and sell or transact.
I've also considered that in recent years, technology has evolved to the point of provided personal commuication and studied the interface between neural activity and thinking.
I suspect the mark is presented as necessary for economic transaction, but is also used by the beast to counterfeit God in the thinking process of man. Such would be an abomination of desolation. It would also compete physically with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ creating a situation where God in His love for us would probably act in wrathful expedient indignation.
There is a difference between potential and actual correlation, though, so this interpretation may not be accurate. When I look at those who are unbelievers in their zeal to promote an artificial state or world through anything antiChristian is seems an ideal target for them will be to control the thoughts of others and in a fashion that is antiChristian. If they found a mechanism to perform this by planting a subdermal computing and communication device, then it would be a natural ploy to associate the device with something for our personal good and safety,..something to preserve our financial identity and retain the apparant security which a cosmic world might appeal to provide.
Those who seek to control in such a world, might not even divulge their ulterior motives as they would already have been hardened in their hearts to reject anything of divine good, but would instead even lower themselves to worship anything supernatural if it promised them power such as fallen angels. A concealed animosity towards anything Christian would prevail in their hearts and their thinking solution would be the mechanics of physically eradicating any thought or volition which might choose God over rebellion from His plan.
But then again you may be correct, in that the temple referenced is more similar to the physical building more associated with the Temple Mount.
Yes, this is correct and I think everything you wrote about the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is on solid theological ground.
There are some verses that may help you in understanding the physical nature of the events surrounding Christ's parousia (or presence or coming).
In Daniel 9:24-27 Gabriel sets conditions and a timeline for Daniel's people, [which I would say extends past Israel in the physical sense, but also to Israel in the spiritual sense since we Gentiles are grafted into Judaism (Rom 11:17)] and Jerusalem, being the focal point for God's attention on earth. Daniel 9:24 lists six things that are to be accomplished and after studying the verbs in each in the Hebrew, I would say that these are to be accomplished through Christ Jesus. Daniel 9:27 sets forth three items:
1. He (the Antichrist or ruler that will come) initiates a Peace treaty ostensibly with Israel (since Jerusalem is one the focus points) to her many enemies. This starts the 70th 'seven' which most people mistakenly identify as the Tribulation period although that is reserved for a lesser amount of time as identified by Jesus in the Olivet Discourse (Mt ch 24, Mk ch 13 or Lk ch 21).
2. In the middle of the week, or 'seven' year period, this same person puts a stop to sacrifice. This requires an altar, perhaps the Mercy Seat on the Ark of the Covenant, and the Temple, whose location is currently occupied by the Dome of the Rock. This ground may be acquired in the aforementioned Peace Treaty that has eluded every world leader until the Antichrist comes along.
3. And "on wing" which the King James translates as "overspreading" using the sheltering image of a wing, the abominations (he shall make it) desolate (or more accurately, desolator since somem has the prefix me which makes it a noun). The problem for translators (and with a dozen different versions I have a dozen different translations) is that in the Hebrew it is (on) kanap siqqusim mesomem -or three nouns in order. I think one way wing can legitimately be translated using the picture form language of Hebrew is like the King James does it, with an attribute of a wing. In this case, from my study, I would combine the quickness of the flood image in Daniel 9:26 and the multiple account of the end times found in Daniel 11:40 with a common attribute of winged animals, their speed, and say "quickly the Desolator (sets up) the Abomination." (I would buttress the argument for translating mesomem as a person because this same word is used as the object of God's Wrath at the end of the verse, and as a theological consideration, God's wrath is not poured out on conditions, but on people.)
The magnitude of this Abomination is revealed in Revelation 13:14, where an image of the Antichrist is set up. And unlike a statue of an emperor or even the man-like pagan god Zeus which Antiochus Epiphanes set up in 168 B.C. (the object of Daniel 11:31), and unlike any animal idol set up by wayward Priests during their periods of transgression, unlike any object of worship that cannot hear, see or talk, this one speaks! This lends emphasis on the little horn of Daniel 7:20 being able to speak, not only does the Antichrist boast and blaspheme God, but his image can talk.
Paul, in his eschatology to the Thessalonians spells out a necessary condition. Remember, he has met John, because he says he would boast not of himself, but of a man that went up to Heaven, and besides Ezekiel, that would be John from his account in Revelation (being revealed by God through Jesus to John). Paul says in 2Th 2:4: "so that he sets himself up in God's temple." (This is where the NIV interjects its theology in translating Daniel 9:27 and takes kanap or wing and adds the words 'of the temple' to wing which actually changes the shape of the Temple since the Temple doesn't or won't have a "wing" in the physical sense of a building.)
So putting all these verses together in a cohesive fashion, at the midweek point of the seventieth 'seven' the Antichrist sets up a talking statue of himself in the reconstructed Temple. This represents his high point of his ascent and initiates a response from God. From there on, the seventieth 'seven' takes on a very different perspective than the first half.
Those who seek to control in such a world, might not even divulge their ulterior motives as they would already have been hardened in their hearts to reject anything of divine good, but would instead even lower themselves to worship anything supernatural if it promised them power such as fallen angels. A concealed animosity towards anything Christian would prevail in their hearts and their thinking solution would be the mechanics of physically eradicating any thought or volition which might choose God over rebellion from His plan.
You are correct in the mark of the Beast as far as I can tell. There is a spiritual aspect of control in wanting to be able to monitor every activity. This mechanism may be presented and even wanted by people as a solution for identity theft and convenience as electronic transfer becomes the norm.
The test for the believer is whether you are willing to put your trust in God for your life, or whether you are going to do what it takes to sustain your own life. This is the Tribulation proper as identified by both the man in linen to Daniel in verse 12:1 and Jesus in His Olivet Discourse (megas thlipsis or great tribulation).
One aspect of the mark can be made back to Deuteronomy. The point in Deuteronomy 6:6-9 is that this would be a sign. Don't confuse hands and head here as being literally the same as Revelation 13:16. The operative word in Deuteronomy is what the NIV calls symbols and the NASB calls a sign. This comes from the word, ‘ot and is best described in the Greek as semeion, according the Word Book of the Old Testament (page 39). As a sign it appears as an outward expression, like the signs in the sky. It can also be a token expression. It can mean a sign of something that is greater than itself like the rainbow is the sign of the covenant.
But in Revelation, the mark is not a sign as it is in the symbolic sense as ‘ot is in the Hebrew. The Greek has it as charagma, an impression, as a mark or a stamp according to the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament. And it is received as in 'to give,' from didomi. You do well to put it into the context that John puts this mark in: it relates wholly to economics.
I think it is relevant that God dismisses those that receive this mark as not being in the book of life. The seal we are to keep is with God, and it is to guide our thoughts and our actions just as the head rules the thoughts and the hand represents the actions which is what the Hebrews were to protect from Moses' sermon in Deuteronomy. But I will not discount this as a physical impression because it is tied to a physical activity, buying and selling and the impression likewise being on the head and hands because this represents a rebellion from trusting God in both thought and action.