2 Peter 1:16 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

Cunningly devised fables; human figments artificially contrived, either to please and gratify men's fancies, or to deceive and pervert their judgment: q.d. The things we have preached unto you (the sum of which is the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ) are the true sayings of God, not the fictions of men: and so he may have respect both to heathenish and Jewish fables. See 1 Timothy 1:4, 1 Timothy 4:7 2 Timothy 4:4 Titus 1:14. The power; this relates to the Divine nature of Christ with its glorious effects, the efficacy of his doctrine, the miracles whereby he confirmed it, and especially his resurrection from the dead, Romans 1:4. And coming of our Lord Jesus Christ; this respects his human nature, his coming in the flesh, in which he manifested the power before mentioned; both together contain the sum of the whole gospel, viz. that Christ, the promised Messiah, is come in the flesh, and that he was furnished with power sufficient and ability to save sinners to the utmost. Or, Christ's coming here may be his second coming, to which the word here used is for the most part applied in the New Testament, and whereof his transfiguration, in the following verse, was a representation and a forerunner; and in the belief of which the apostle would confirm these saints against those that scoffed at it, 2 Peter 3:3,4. But were eye-witnesses of his majesty: by Christ's majesty may be understood all that glory which did shine out in him during the whole time of his abode upon earth, 1 Thessalonians 1:14, but especially that more eminent manifestation of it in his transfiguration, in the next verse.