Mark 8:29

And he asked them, But who say ye that I am? Peter answered and saith unto him, Thou art the Christ.

It is never enough to know what others believe regarding the identity of our Lord; and the answer to the question here pressed upon his apostles by the Saviour is exactly the pivot upon which the destiny of every soul on earth is turned. Peter, apparently speaking for all of the Twelve, confessed, "Thou art the Christ." The record in Mark is a summary which omits the following references to: the Son of the living God, Christ's confession of Peter, the promise to build his church on the rock, the keys of the kingdom of heaven, the gates of Hades, and binding and loosing on earth. This commentator's volume on Matthew has some eleven pages of text devoted to the discussion of these things and of such related topics as the primacy of Peter, the so-called Petrine succession, and other questions raised by Matthew's more complete account of this key episode. See my Commentary on Matthew, pp. 243-253.

Thou art the Christ ... is shorter than the confession as given by Matthew, "Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God"; but it is in no sense inadequate, summarizing, as it does in these four words, the grand total of the power and godhead of the Son of God. As Cranfield declared:

This title (The Christ), in spite of all the false and narrow hopes which had become attached to it (in the popular thought of that day), was peculiarly fitted to express his true relation both to the Old Testament and to the people of God.[9]