Sorry for the late reply; I've been traveling.
I hope you had a good time.
Regarding
Matthew 10:41-42, we also need to include the verse before, verse 40. Together,
Matthew 10:40-42 teaches that as chaff is burned up/consumed by fire, so will everything offensive and those practicing lawlessness be cast into a fiery furnace (2618,
katakaio). It sounds to me that those practicing lawlessness will be burned up like chaff.
Mat 13:40 Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, 42 and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
These verses say that weeds are burned up but they do not say that people are burned up. They say that evildoers will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
If God is a consuming fire, I don't see how that's different than saying He's an annihilating fire. Can fire consume something without annihilating it?
Here, again, God is a consuming fire. It doesn't say that his fire consumes people. In a previous message, I wrote that it is possible that some people may be so full of sin that nothing is left in their personality after their sin is consumed.
Regarding death, what makes you think that the first death is spiritual rather than physical?
This is really based on 2 things: 1) Adam and Eve died spiritually immediately after they disobeyed God. 2) The Apostle Paul told the Ephesians that they were dead before they believed the Gospel.
Hebrews 9:27-28 says that man dies once and afterward faces judgment in the same manner that Christ came for our sins but will come a second time. I see both the first coming and death as physical, as well as the second coming and death. Do you understand
Hebrews 9:27 as referencing spiritual death?
Heb 9:26 for then he would have had to suffer death many times — from the founding of the universe on. But as it is, he has appeared once at the end of the ages in order to do away with sin through the sacrifice of himself. 27 Just as human beings have to die once, but after this comes judgment, 28 so also the Messiah, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to deliver those who are eagerly waiting for him.
This passage is about Jesus' sacrificing his physical body as an offering for sin. The point is that unlike bulls and goats, which had to offered yearly, Jesus died only once. In a similar manner to other human beings who physically die only once.
Similarly, doesn't
1 Corinthians 15:22-23 describe the resurrection from physical death?
1Co 15:22 For just as in connection with Adam all die, so in connection with the Messiah all will be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: the Messiah is the firstfruits; then those who belong to the Messiah, at the time of his coming;
I think this describes the resurrection from spiritual death. Christians are spiritually resurrected in baptism. If you understand this to be describing physical death, you reach 2 incorrect conclusions: 1) There was no physical death before Adam, which is unscientific. 2) Christians will be physically resurrected before unbelievers, which is unbiblical.
Therefore, would you agree that when people experience the second death, they no longer live physically (in addition to not living spiritually, of course)?
1Co 15:44 It is sown a physical body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body.
When it is raised, the body is spiritual. How is this to be understood in the context of the second death? Is the spiritual body subject to physical death? I doubt it.
I think the Church teaching of hellfire is true. It may not last forever. Perhaps some will be released and others will be annihilated. But to say that there is no punishment, as universalists may say, is incorrect. And to say that people are immediately annihilated, as atheists say, is not correct either. Do we agree about this?