You say so

In Sunday school today, we were reading scripture passages that pertained to the trials of Jesus. I noticed in a couple of the passages, when Jesus stood in front of Potius Pilate, the following answer:

Now Jesus stood before the governor; and the governor asked him, ‘Are you the King of the Jews?’ Jesus said, ‘You say so.’ (Matthew 27:11)

I've always thought that Jesus' response -- "You say so" -- was avoidance. I thought perhaps he didn't want to answer.

As I think about it now, I think he wasn't avoiding, but he was telling the truth. "You say so." I wonder if Pilate was asking a question that would have limited Jesus' role and identity. I wonder if Jesus was telling Pilate that to call him "king" is to limit what he has come to do. "If you say so" would be another of way of saying, "You might call it that, but I would not limit or define what I am here to do by your narrow image of what being a king means." It wasn't that Jesus was avoiding the idea of being king, or didn't think of himself in a the role of king.

"You say so," is just another way of telling them that their labels reduced him to human terms. He was much more.