At Gihon

Solomon’s coronation takes place at Gihon (1 Kings 1:38), a water source near Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 32:30). The name itself means “a gushing, a bursting forth.”

It’s an appropriate place to make a king, because the king himself is a source of living water to his people. A king rules to ensure the flourishing of his people, and to do that, goods (relative intangibles like justice and peace, legal and judicial pronouncements, material goods) must flow from the king to the people. A king who keeps all the “water” of the land to himself isn’t going to have a kingdom for long. A wilderness isn’t much of a kingdom, and that’s what a king has who refuses to be a spring. He has to dispense in order to retain his power. He has to flow out to flourish.

Gihon is also the name of one of the rivers flowing from Eden. Solomon is a new Adam ruling the earth, dressing and keeping the garden until the garden raises up as a temple. Solomon is an Eden himself, a garden through whom flow the gushing waters of the Spirit that makes the land fruitful.