The message of this passage is plain enough. In these verses, God charges us to hold one another accountable for sin, both individually and corporately.

Jesus cautions us of the sin of having a bad attitude towards another believer by which we actually become the cause of that brother or sister being discouraged in the faith, of stalling out in their walk with Christ and in their growth in the faith. In these verses, God calls us to take great care in our attitudes towards other believers.

How Isaiah must have wondered at this one verse, Isaiah 9-6- Who could this Messiah be and what was He going to do, this One who would be born, who would come into the world as a baby born of a woman, but One of whom we must understand is called -Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace-- In this one verse, God actually reveals to us a great deal about our Savior. God gives us a Savior who can do for us what only God can do.

So many people in Jesus' day were confused about who Jesus was and they did not believe that He was the Messiah. Because of their confusion about the Scriptures- because they didn't understand the truth about Elijah- because of their confusion about the prophecies in God's word- and because they didn't believe that John the Baptist and Jesus fulfilled the prophecies, so many of those confused people rejected the only One who could saved them from God's wrath. Many people today are equally confused because they are ignorant of Scripture or because they have heard all kinds of distortions and misrepresentations of the gospel of Jesus Christ. God grants us knowledge in His word of who Jesus really is- He is our only Savior.

Jesus alone is able to save you. There is no other salvation, no other rescue from the judgment of God. And so, in this verse, God declares that Christ alone is our Messiah and Savior. No one else is qualified to save you, no one else but Jesus only. The question then is very simple- Are you yourself looking only to Christ for your own salvation-

In these two verses, God calls every believer to maintain both fear and familiarity with Christ. There is in Scripture and in our own experience as believers the affirmation that our relationship with our Savior, who is both fully divine and fully human, involves both a great reverential fear and a deeply personal knowledge and tender familiarity. Each of us is called to maintain this tension in our relationship with our heavenly Father and with our Savior. To veer too far in either direction is to lose sight of the biblical truth of who God is as we are presented with the Father's glory in the transfiguration.

God grants to us His very presence through the word of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you want to know God and to be known by Him personally and eternally, then you must -listen- to the Lord Jesus. You must hear His word, the gospel. You must listen in the sense that you heed what He says, that you believe what He says, that you obey what He says, that you would actually follow Him in complete submission and devotion of all that you are.

God reveals to us the divine glory of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. - In verses 1 - 2, we see so clearly and so powerfully the divine glory of the Lord Jesus manifested visibly in His body.

Why were Moses and Elijah present at Christ's Transfiguration- What was the significance of their appearance with Him on that mountain- Why not Abraham- Why not David- In this transfiguration event, God reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ through His fulfillment of the Old Testament, of both the Law and the Prophets. Our Lord doesn't just fulfill some of it. He fulfills all of it. For that reason, He alone is worthy of such glorification, both on the mountain and throughout all eternity. Because of this, we can know that He alone is able to save us from our sins and from the wrath to come.