Here are two things I highlighted recently in my reading.
This one describes my calling. This is my duty, my earnest desire, and my joy.
Be exhorted, O ye saints of God, to walk in the exercise of grace. It is the minister’s duty, with the continual breath of exhortation, and if need be, reproof, to keep this heavenly fire clean on the saints’ altar. Peter saw it necessary to have the bellows always in his hands, ‘I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and be established in the present truth,’ II Peter 1:12.
This second one describes what happens when we fail. One bit of laziness leads to another. One half-step of compromise causes more stumbling than we would expect. I want to be found standing my ground, and doing the work God set me about!
Fall to the work God sets thee about, and thou engagest his strength for thee. The way of the Lord is strength. Run from thy work, and thou engagest God’s strength against thee; he will send some storm or other after thee to bring home his runaway servant. How oft hath the coward been killed in a ditch, or under some hedge, when the valiant soldier stood his ground and kept his place got off with safety and honour.
Both are from William Gurnall’s massive work on the Christian in Complete Armor.