In addition to other lessons, the Book of Job teaches us the importance of discernment. It teaches us to look behind a person’s words, and see what is unexpressed as well as what is not expressed. The same words can be used by people with quite different theologies. Sometimes this is because people are wanting to hide what their meaning, and make their words acceptable to someone who they know has a very different way of thinking. They hope to make a statement that is received as true by others, perhaps to draw them into a false alliance, which they would never be entered into if the full position was known. This deliberate double speak is the language of compromisers. Ecumenical dialogues between evangelicals and liberals have made use of this. Those who are faithful to God, on the other hand, strive for crystal clarity. They are not trying to draw others to their position who really believe something else. They wish to exclude all error and define the truth so carefully that there is no room for any other confusion. They wish to protect the truth, not to build bridges with those in error. When God speaks, it is that men and women should come to him and strive to understand what he has said. It is not to enter into discussion with man who believes something else. The compilers of the wonderful statements of faith which were produced in the great age of Confessions, worked in this way. They refined their language again and again, considering all the heresies they might encounter, and wanting to leave no room for any of them. They loved the truth and set no value on the doctrines of men. They may have had an imperfect understanding of the word of God in places, but they strove with all their might to make clear what they understood.