Right - agreed. That's pretty much what I was getting at in post #338 - the focus is really on the extreme nature of the consequences rather than on whether the gift is or isn't conditional. If we completely eliminated the gift (offer of salvation) and just said that God created the reality He did, with every human suffering eternal torment because of (inevitable) sin, the extreme nature would be highlighted - enough, it seems to me, to make a reasonable human question the Perfect Holiness, Wisdom, Love and Justice behind the plan. That's not fair, of course, because in Christian theology the gift was part of the plan from before the creation - but this is how it works out for those who don't accept the gift.Happy to elaborate.
The consequence of not accepting the free gift is contingent upon a gift being offered as necessary in the first place. Because of the human sin condition.
The offering is afforded by the same entity, God, that created the condition first. Making the later gift God's prerogative.
If all people had a full and fair opportunity to turn to Christ, which they clearly don't, and the consequence of not doing so were simply separation from God in an otherwise tolerable existence (or even annihilation), this would strike most people as more loving, wise and just than hideous consequences that seem to most to greatly exceed the magnitude of the offense. If the most godly person I ever knew suffers eternal torment because of some minor sin and a failure to turn to Christ in whatever opportunity he had, this strikes me and most people as weirdly excessive.