Have you ever wondered what the word Messiah indicates? It is the transliteration of a Hebrew word, Meshiach. The Greek New Testament translation of it is Christos. Both words, in English, mean “The Anointed One.” Jesus was the One anointed by God for the ministry in which He was to engage. After His anointing with the Spirit at His baptism (symbolized by the dove descending on Him), he faced His first battle with the evil one—the three-pronged temptation in the wilderness. Having successfully warded him off with the Scriptures, He immediately took up His ministry and began itinerate preaching, as He went about healing and preaching, he called for repentance since the kingdom of God was at hand. The advent of that kingdom, as all Old and (later) New Testament predictions declare, was the announcement of a new era in which one must repent and believe the Gospel or perish in the terrible destruction of Jerusalem which was about to occur.

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