When John sent two of his disciples to ask Jesus the very important question: "Are you the one to come or do we look for someone else?" Jesus did not answer with a simple "yes" or "no".

Instead, he called upon them to reflect on their experience: "Go and report to John what you have seen and heard". Implicitly Jesus is saying to them: your experience of what I do and teach should lead you to decide about me. That decision should lead you to take responsibility for your answer to John.

Either a yes or no answer to their question would have been wrong or, at least, inappropriate. Jesus could not have answered "No", for he was indeed the one who was to come, the promised Messiah. But if Jesus had said 'Yes', there was the risk that he would have left them with their false notions of a political Messiah, and so would have missed the opportunity to open their hearts to thetremendous new revelation that Jesus was bringing to them