Chapter 10
The vision still continues.
2022 - This verse:
1 Then I looked, and behold, on the expanse that was over the heads of the cherubim there appeared above them something like a sapphire, in appearance like a throne. [Eze 10:1 ESV]. God sits on a throne of sapphire. It shows up over and over. Look at how the thrones in the Sheep and Goat, and the GWT are described. If they are not sapphire, then it is not God who sits on them, it is Christ!
The one in linen is told, from the sapphire throne, to go in among the whirling wheels, and throw burning coals on the city.
2022 - I had forgotten that the wheels were mentioned again, and that again, they are under the throne. Is it the Angel of the Lord that takes his place in the center of the execution of God's will, or is this a vision of the centrality of Christ in the plan of God? You could make arguments either way.
The wheels described, pretty much as in the earlier chapter. Many eyes, God sees all. Go without turning - God's will cannot be turned. Interesting that the wheels and the cherubim were connected. Where ever the cherubim moved, so did the wheels. Ezekiel confirms that these cherubim were the same as he saw previously. The glory of the Lord was standing above them in this vision.
2022 - What are the coals about? Coals from the altar, able to purify even the corruption of Jerusalem at this time. Fire that will consume this world at the end so it can be created new and uncorrupted?
2022 - These wheels are once again described in great detail by Ezekiel. This time, the faces of the cherubs are a little different. Before it was ox, human, eagle, lion. Now it is cherub, human, eagle, lion. Why would this be? Was there an altar among the wheels in the first version? Is the passing of the coals by an angel to the one in linen a reference to the angels aiding in passing the Law to Moses that we saw in Hebrews? If the one in linen is Christ, is this passing of the coals able to purify all of Jerusalem symbolic of the New Covenant being passed to Christ, that he might bring all to repentance by his blood? Come on! How could mere men make all this up, and make it fit so spectacularly perfectly in what will come later in the New Testament!
2022 - Ezekiel seems far more obsessed with describing the actions of the cherubim and the wheels than with God's actions at this time. Why would that be his emphasis? The picture of God leaving the Temple is also significant. He leaves, with pomp and circumstance, and He never again fills the temple with smoke...does he? Does that happen in Nehemiah? This is an important thing to note. Perhaps this all means that God himself has left off being present on earth, and from this point on, only these cherubim and the man in linen will dwell with men, interact with men, speak with men. God's will carried out by messengers and His direct power will no longer be exercised on the earth. OR...this is the passing of dominion over the kingdoms of the earth from God to Christ. Those coals represent something. Why not that? Another seriously deep and symbolic book.