I’m with you. The reason that issue is so important to me, though, is that I don’t see it as a benign teaching. Put yourself in the shoes of a man who has never heard of Jesus. You’re living your life, having good days and bad days, but overall, as with any natural man (your “animal” existence) you are living and taking one day at a time.
Then some guy comes along and says, “believe in jesus and be saved!”. And you say, “Saved from what?” He says that God is going to torture for all eternity all men who don’t accept his death as an atonement for their “sins”.
The guy is gonna say, “you’re nuts”. Happens a lot.
But what if he answeres, “Saved from death. After your body dies, you will be given a new, imperishable body to live in the ages with your creator.”
Now, he may or may not accept, but trying to first make his situation worse, and with no scripture to back it up, is not only pointless, but seriously damages the credibility of the message.
The non-believers I know (non-believers in ANYTHING, not just Baptistic Protestant Christianity) already believe in annihilation. I suppose, not having asked, that whether, hearing of the possibility of annihilation, they would prefer it over living with God, which some have told me they can only imagine as being a colossal bore. Whether such people are reachable with the notion of the place described below... is a matter for the Holy Spirit’s work.
Revelation 19:20:
And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
Revelation 20:10:
And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.
Revelation 20:14:
And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.
Revelation 20:15:
And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.