6 These have the power to shut up the sky, that it may not rain during the days of their prophecy. They have power over the waters, to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with every plague, as often as they desire.
power to shut up the sky – literally “heaven” as it bears the meaning of “heaven” in Rev 10:5-6, etc. The two witnesses are “the anointed ones” (Zech 4:14), who have been “anointed” by the Spirit of Christ. They have the keys to the kingdom of heaven. They have the power to bring forth the spiritual rain of the Spirit of Christ, the “Rock” that strikes the “statue,” of the beast (Dan 2:35). These are also great men of faith, like Elijah, “who prayed earnestly that it would not rain,” because God’s people had bowed down to Baal (and to the beast in the New Testament) … “then he prayed again, and the sky produced rain,” (Jas 5:17-18, and 1 Kgs 17:1).
Jesus and James told us that Elijah “shut up the sky” for 3 years and six months (Luke 4:25, Jas 5:17). This prefigured the coming spiritual drought of “3 1/2 years” time, “time, times and half a time,” of the saints in the hands of the beast.
turn the water into blood – the false religion of the beast has been exposed by the preaching of the two witnesses, and baptism into the kingdom of the beast now results in spiritual death for those who seek to be saved in the kingdom of the beast. (This metaphor of water turning into blood is also used in Rev 8:8, and Rev 16:3, to describe the spiritual deaths of those who refuse to be baptized into the end time Sanctified Church.) The two witnessess were two lampstands. They were estabished by the Spirit of Christ, and had the authority of the Spirit of Christ (John 20:22-23) to remit sins through baptism. But the Catholic Church had no such authority.
and strike the earth with a plague – the saints are in captivity of the beast, and the two witnesses are now given power to free them from “the Great City” which is “spiritually called . . . Egypt” – in verse 8. The Two Witnesses are compared to Moses and Aaron, who were given the power of plagues to free Israel from Egypt.