Letting us Stew in the Valley of Tears Defangs the Serpent

Is there any better way to convince us that fire is hot than by letting us put our fingers in the flame (Matthew 5: 29-30)? Personal experience with the truth is more persuasive than a plethora of words about it - even when the source of the words is God. So God lets us put our fingers into the flame. The flame is extremely persuasive about the hotness of the fire. So, too, life in the valley of tears is extremely persuasive about its sourness.

Letting us stew in the valley of tears defangs the serpent. It cuts his balls off. It drains from the serpent's lie its power to deceive. We learn that we do not become "gods" without God during our passage through the valley of tears. We learn for ourselves that the serpent bullshitted us. Our passage through the valley of tears shatters the illusion conjured up by the serpent that sugarcoats the sourness of godlessness. The sugarcoating of godhood with which the serpent embellished a life lived without God in the valley of tears crumbles before our eyes. We realize we were duped. We gave up everything for nothing. Our passage through the valley of tears destroys our gullibility. It makes us cynical, skeptical and suspicious of strangers with whom we have no track-record who promise us godhood in exchange for abandoning God.