Listen to the multitude identify Jesus while He was hanging on the cross in Mark 15:32: “Let this Christ, the King of Israel, now come down from the cross, so that we may see and believe!” Clearly the Jews associated the “Messiah” (the Hebrew word for “Christ”; John 1:41) with the “King of Israel.”
There were two offices, possibly three, that were anointed with oil in the Old Testament age: priests (Exodus 30:22-33), kings (1 Samuel 10:1; 16:1, 13), and at least on one occasion, a prophet (1 Kings 19:16).
But then Isaiah comes along and predicts that the “Servant of the Lord” will be anointed, not with oil, but with the Holy Spirit (61:1ff). When God anointed one, or had him anointed, it showed God’s favor, God’s approval, God’s decision to set that person to a specific task. Thus, we find in Luke 23:35 the Jews associate the “Christ” (“Anointed One”) with God’s “Chosen One.”
Other passages, like Luke 23:2, associate the “Christ” with the “King.”
Ever since the preaching of Isaiah, and then strengthened through the preaching of Ezekiel, Joel, Micah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, the center of attention of Jewish expectation was the blessings of the coming Messianic age.
We see that expectation in the words of the old saint at the presentation of Jesus in the temple. Simeon was “looking for the consolation of Israel” (Luke 2:25). In Simeon’s words, God had allowed him to see “God’s salvation,” and Simeon quotes from and applies to Jesus the words of Isaiah 9:2: “A light of revelation to the Gentiles.”
We see that same expectation also in the same context, in the words of the precious widow, Anna, who, Luke writes was “looking for the redemption of Jerusalem” (2:38). Those are Messianic expectations.
The “giving” of the Holy Spirit was associated with the Messiah’s work (Eze. 36:26-27), consider Mark 1:7-8. Jesus, the One anointed with the Holy Spirit, would in turn, give the Holy Spirit – one of the two blessings associated by the prophets with the Messiah and the Messianic Age.
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I find it interesting that the apostles through the rest of the NT, rarely call Jesus “Son of Man,” even though it was Jesus’ preferred designation for Himself. The phrase is found 84 times in the Gospel accounts. From Acts, it is only found four times: Acts 7:56; Heb. 2:6 (a quotation of Psalm 8), and Revelation 1:13; 14:14.
On the other hand, “Christ” (Messiah) is used by the writers of the NT 477 times [131 times in the phrase “Jesus Christ” or “Christ Jesus” – 91 times] but only 52 times in the Gospels and only twice in contexts where Jesus Himself claims to be the Messiah.
I suggest it is because Jesus was crucified as being a “false Messiah” and the apostles chose that designation to emphasize that, based on the resurrection, no, He was in fact, the real, authentic Messiah (see Paul’s defense of that very topic in Acts 17:2-4.)
–Paul Holland
