Avoid Presumption

Pride comes before a fall. Proverbs 16: 18

A brother began to pester Abba Theodore with all sorts of questions and opinions about aspects of God’s work, none of which he had seriously engaged in himself. The old Abba said to him: ‘You have not yet found the ship you are to sail in, or put your baggage in it, so how is that you seem to be already in the city you plan to sail to? When you have first worked hard in the thing you talk about, then you can speak from the experience of the thing itself.’
Desert Sayings.

Three brother came to an Abba in Scete. The first proudly told him ‘I have committed the Old and New Testament to memory’. ‘You have filled the air with words’ the Abba told him. The second informed him: ‘I have transcribed the Old and New Testaments with my own hands’. ‘And you have filled your windows with manuscripts’ was the reply. The third, who felt he had devoted so much time to prayer and study that he had no time to spare for household jobs announced that ‘The grass grows on my hearthstone’. The Abba said: ‘And you have driven hospitality from you’.
Desert Sayings

An Englishman is a self-made man and worships his maker.
English saying

Fools rush in where angels fear to tread
British proverb

Speak up to but not beyond your experience.
Frank Buchman

Almighty, I’m steeped in the ‘I know best’ mentality.
I invite your Holy Spirit to convict me of presumption,
To expose every lingering bit of it in any corner of my life
And to winkle it all out.
Give to me the wisdom of humility