Eternal life is to know God as our Father and Jesus Christ as our Lord, Saviour and Forerunner ( John.17:3 ). You must develop an intimacy with your heavenly Father and with Jesus, if you are to live a steady Christian life. That is the greatest safeguard against backsliding.

It is not enough to hear stirring messages, even if they are anointed words from God. Even the manna that fell from heaven began to breed worms and to stink within 24 hours ( Exod.16:20 ). It is easy to lose the freshness of your Christian life and to become stale in 24 hours!! But when the same manna was kept inside the ark (in the most holy place of the tabernacle), in the presence of God, it did not breed worms or stink for all the 40 years that the Israelites wandered in the wilderness, and even for the hundreds of years thereafter in Canaan ( Exod.16:33 ; Heb.9:4 ). That is the power of the presence of God to keep everything fresh in our lives. So everything that you hear second-hand about the Lord, from others (in meetings and on tapes) must be taken before the Lord and converted into first-hand knowledge that you get from the Lord through his Word directly.

In Matthew 11:27-29 Jesus tells us that we cannot know the Father unless Jesus reveals the Father to us. In order to get that revelation, He invites us to come to Him and to take His yoke (the cross) upon us and to learn gentleness and humility from Him (read all those 3 verses together). These are the only two things that Jesus asked us to learn from Him. So you must look into the Word to see the glory of Jesus in these areas especially.

(1) Gentleness. First of all, Jesus' gentleness is seen in the fact that He always took the side of sinful people against the Pharisees. We see this in the case of the woman caught in adultery ( John.8:1-12 ). And also in the case of the sinful woman who anointed His feet in Simon the Pharisee's house ( Luke.7:36-50 ). As long as Simon did not have a critical attitude towards that sinful woman, Jesus never said anything. But the moment Jesus saw that Simon despised her, He rebuked him for his lack of courtesy and love for God ( Luke.7:40-47 ). Jesus was very severe on those who were critical of repentant sinners. He always takes the side of the repentant sinner against Bible-thumping Pharisees. This is a great comfort to us to know. We must learn this gentleness from Him.

The second aspect of Jesus' gentleness is seen in his forgiving attitude towards those who harmed him. When people called Him the prince of demons, He immediately said that they were forgiven ( Matt.12:24 , 32 ). When they ill-treated Him, He never threatened them. He just kept quiet ( 1 Pet.2:23 ). This is the second aspect of Jesus' gentleness that we must learn. We must shake off the slightest thought of bitterness, revenge, a grudge, or an unforgiving spirit, like we would immediately shake off a lizard or a cockroach that falls on our hand.

(2) Humility. The first six verses in Matthew's gospel show us something of the humility of Jesus in the family-line that He chose to be born through. Jewish genealogies do not normally mention the names of women. But there arefour women mentioned here - Tamar, Rahab, Ruth and Bathsheba. Tamar was the one who had a child by committing adultery with her father-in-law Judah ( Gen.38 ). Rahab was a well-known prostitute in Jericho ( Josh.2 ). Ruth was a Moabite - a descendant of Moab who was born through incest - Lot's daughter making her father commit adultery with her ( Gen.19 ). And Bathsheba was the one who committed adultery with David. Why have the names of these four women (who were all connected in some way with sexual sin) been mentioned in the very first paragraph of the New Testament? In order to show that Jesus came into the world to identify with sinners and to save them.

Jesus' humility is seen in the lowly job (of a carpenter) that He took on earth and in the servant-attitude that He had all through His earthly life. A servant-attitude is one that is constantly on the alert, looking out for the needs of others and that quickly moves in to meet such needs as soon as they are observed (e.g. Jesus washing the disciples' feet).

Andrew Murray's book on `Humility' defines humility as: "Being willing to be nothing, so that God might be all in all". This is what Jesus delighted to be. This is what we must learn from Him. So take the yoke of Jesus always on your neck and learn gentleness and humility from Him. Thus He will be able to reveal the Father more and more to you.