Why does this teaching matter?
Ravenhill identifies the fundamental choice every preacher faces: popularity or faithfulness. Scripture consistently warns that the world will reject the message of holiness, and that the last days will be marked by people who accumulate teachers who tell them what they want to hear rather than what they need to hear.
What did Leonard Ravenhill teach?
"If you want to be popular, preach happiness. If you want to be unpopular, preach holiness."
Speaker: Leonard Ravenhill
Source: Revival conference sermon
What does Scripture confirm?
2 Timothy 4:3-4
"For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables."
— NKJV
Paul prophesied exactly what Ravenhill observed — people choosing teachers based on comfort rather than truth. The popularity of 'happiness preaching' is itself a fulfillment of this warning.
John 15:18-19
"If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you."
— NKJV
Jesus guarantees that faithful followers will be hated by the world. A preacher who is universally popular should examine whether he is preaching the same message as Christ.
1 Peter 1:15-16
"But as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, 'Be holy, for I am holy.'"
— NKJV
God's command is holiness, not happiness. While God does give joy, the biblical priority is conformity to His character — which the flesh naturally resists.