style="display:none" not working [SOLVED]

style="display:none" not working [SOLVED]

OUTPUT:
1
message shows up correctly
2
PROBLEM OCCURS HERE and the message disappears all of the sudden with no js error
3

alert(1);
$("#ajax-message")[0].innerHTML = message;
alert(2);
$("#ajax-message").attr("style", "display:inline");
alert(3);

<div id="ajax-message" style="display:inline;"></div>

?how can i access the style display attribute and toggle between inline and none....the above is not working....thank you.