[nonsporting]

... If someone, today, created a 100 foot diameter lake of fire 20 feet deep and then threw me into it I know what would happen to me: I would suffer immense pain for a few seconds and then I would die. All done. I did not have to strain the meaning of words at all to come to that conclusion.

Yes, but as with all analogies they fail. The lake of fire discussed at judgement is not the first death but the second which is eternal:

"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal (aionios) fire prepared for the devil and his angels. ... Then they will go away to eternal (aionios) punishment, but the righteous to eternal (aionios) life." (Matthew 25:41,46)

[RobRoy]

>>Yes, but as with all analogies they fail. The lake of fire discussed at judgement is not the first death but the second which is eternal<<

I agree. If I drop my car into a vat of molten steel, it’s death will be eternal. It ain’t comming back.

Death, by definition, is an ending. And saying it is eternal means it will not be undone.

If I paint a wall blue for all eternity, it doesn’t mean I paint it for all eternity. It means I painted it once and for all eternity it STAYS blue it is (aionios) blueness, but the event that caused it to be blue is finite.

The punishment is death, and it is eternal. It will not be undone.

And

[RobRoy]

>>Yes, but as with all analogies they fail.<<

All analogies and parables ultimately fail. Ifan analogy does not fail at some point, it becomes the thing itself.