on the two witnesses in scripture

I know that some of you, maybe all of you have the belief that the two witnesses are two actual individuals who are going to appear in Jerusalem, preach, be killed, and then rise up after 3 days.

First off, I respect that view and I'm not trying to tell you what to believe. I would like to deepen your understanding of the bible and its teachings however.

We have the saying that Elijah will come before the terrible day of the Lord.
Just before Christ appeared on earth, the religious Jews had become apostate, which is the main reason that they could not recognize Christ. And so "Elijah" appeared in the person of John the Baptist.

John denied that he was Christ and also, that he was Elijah.
He lived in the desert, dressed like Elijah and to the people who were looking for him, certainly seemed to be that great prophet.
So what did he do? He baptized these people "unto repentance". He couldn't have baptized all Israel, but he did a fair number.

When Jesus came, he said that Elijah had come, "if you will accept it". By that he meant that John had come, "in the spirit of Elijah", and what was that spirit, other than the Holy Spirit.

Now we see in scripture that God has witnesses, the two tablets of the testimony, the two books of Judaism, the Torah and the Tanach, ( the Law and the Prophets, symbolized by Moses and Elijah) the Old and New Testaments. And then he has his people, all the believing witnesses who ever lived, and all the believers of today. These are the two olive trees, one cultivated, one wild and grafted in, the Jews and the Gentiles.

The twelve commandments are hated and thrown out of places, the Torahs are burned, the bible is held up to ridicule daily and Jews and Christians are hated world wide for their belief. We are killed all day long. Even on this forum, people spit at us and wish us dead. Some believe they have sound reason for that and the world is going to be better off without us.
When God withdraws his Holy Spirit and all of us are gone from the world, then they will weep and want us back, like pharaoh did the fleeing Israelites. They will experience the worse Hell on earth that there has ever been, that's what they've got to look forward to.

Well what do we have that they really hate? We have the Spirit of God and they hate God. No matter what they do to us, we just keep coming back. And we come and we witness of God and of Christ, in the Spirit of Elijah. As many as they kill and rejoice over, more of us just stand up, but not of our own strength.
All glory to God, amen.