This is a title of our Lord, meaning the Anointed. Messiah (Hebrew) and Christ (Greek), both meaning Anointed, are interchangeable words. We read, "I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when He is come, He will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto you am He." (John 4:25, 26).
The actual word, Messiah, occurs only twice in the Old Testament (Dan. 9:25,26), and only twice in the New Testament (John 1:41;4:25). In the Old Testament there were three classes of persons anointed on their induction to office—priests, prophets, kings. The word, anointed, referring to individuals, occurs 43 times in the Old Testament. Seeing that practically in every case the word applies to priests, prophets and kings, it is translated by the word, anointed, for the word, Messiah or Christ, can only refer to our Lord. At the same time the anointings of priests, prophets and kings, no doubt were typical of our Lord, who sustains all these three offices. He is God's Priest, our Great High Priest (Heb. 3:1); He is God's Prophet, for Deuteronomy 18:18 tells of God promising that He would raise up a Prophet like unto Moses, but whose words should not fall to the ground; and lastly He is God's King, for we read in Psa. 2:6, how the day will come when our Lord shall sit as King upon the holy hill of Zion. We have our Lord presented prophetically as King and Priest upon His throne in the following Scripture,
" Even He shall build the temple of the LORD; and He shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon His throne: and He shall be a Priest upon His throne: and the counsel of peace shall be between them both." (Zech. 6:13).
Finally, it is interesting, that while our Lord is uniquely and pre-eminently THE ANOINTED OF GOD, believers in this dispensation receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit of God, whereby they are sealed unto the day of redemption. (Eph. 4:30).