—People who no longer exist probably find it hard to engage in weeping and gnashing of teeth, whose worm never dies, suffering everlasting punishment.—
Well, I do believe that the punishment, death, is everlasting. But it brings up the concept of the passage of time in eternity. I like to say that “time” is a current that flows in an ocean called “eternity”.
I think the Mark verses are basically saying that their punishment is death and they STAY dead.
I have a Sunday school student, an adult, who believes just the way you do. We have been going through Revelation 19 and 20 and it’s been an ordeal with him. I mean, he can believe whatever he wants, but I don’t understand his coming to a Southern Baptist Sunday school and argue with everybody! Last time I quoted something I had read in J.V. McGee’s commentary: I’d rather live like eternal literal hell is real and die to find out I was wrong, than live like it is not real (or not literal, or not eternal) and then find out that I was wrong! He glared at me, but for the first time didn’t have anything to say.