Now, in regard to God's enemies, are you saying that God deals differently with Jewish enemies? They don't get flung into the lake of fire? Scripture says God gets revenge on his enemies by removing their dross, refining them and making them into a righteous city. (Isa 1:25, 26) Seems to me enemies are enemies, apostates or apostates and God is delineating his concept of revenge. How different it is from man's!
"A hugh stretch"? Not so, for scripture closely links fiery furnaces with the refining process. (Note, by contrast, Nebuchadnezzar's furnace was not a refining furnace, but an above the ground construction. It's purpose was to inflict pain for pain's sake.) Egypt, for example, is referred to as an iron smelting furnace. The word most commonly used for furnace is kibshan, which means a smelting furnace for reducing metals. It occurs in Isa 48:10,11 where God is addressing Jewish rebels who refuse to listen to him or testify to what he had done (rather like the Great White Throne group). "See, I have refined you, though not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction. For my own sake, for my own sake, I do this. How can I let myself be defamed? I will not yield my glory to another." It's a bit off topic, but where is his respect for their "free will"?
Kibshan also occurs in Eze 22:18-22, where God purviews the entire refining process: "Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to me; all of them are the copper, tin, iron and lead left inside a furnace. They are but the dross of silver. Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: 'Because you have all become dross, I will gather you into Jerusalem. As men gather silver, copper, iron, lead and tin into a furnace to melt it with a fiery blast, so will I gather you in my anger and my wrath and put you inside the city and melt you. I will gather you and I will blow on you with my fiery wrath, and you will be melted inside her. As silver is melted in a furnace, so you will be melted inside her, and you will know that I the LORD have poured out my wrath upon you.' " The purpose of the second smelt is not to inflict pain for pain's sake, but to correct.
The word for furnace in Malachi describes a firepot. However, it, too, is linked with the refining process. "But who can endure the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears? For he will be like a refiner's fire or a launderer's soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifer of silver....." (Mal 3:2,3)
Jesus says that the wicked will be thrown into a fiery furnace, kaminos in the Greek, a refining furnace. They, too, receive corrective punishment, since the Greek word used for punishment in Mt 25:46 refers to remedial punishment designed to benefit those who receive it.
This just briefly touches on some of the references to furnaces, fire and refining. That is why word studies on them is so helpful in understanding the purpose of the lake of fire and the Great White Throne judgment.
