The surface that looked like the sky, shining like crystal, separated God’s realm from the human realm. It marked the boundary between heaven (the place of God’s presence) and earth.
The vision includes images of the sky, the cherubim (see study note on Ezekiel 1:11–14), and the rainbow (Ezekiel 1:28). These images remind us of the opening chapters of Genesis. They suggest that the story about to unfold concerns the destruction of what God had created, followed by its re-creation (making it new again).
In Genesis, God destroyed the world with a flood and later restored it through Noah. In a similar way, Ezekiel’s world was being undone and would later be restored.