Sign of the (End) Times

From the Amarillo Globe News, and article about a guy in Amarillo who teaches eschatology (study of the "End Times") each week.  Read the full article here.  A snippet for your edification:

“We are living, in my opinion, in the End Times,” Phillips said.  “Prophecy is being fulfilled exponentially, even little verses people don’t ever think about.”

   As long as I've lived, which admittedly is not very long (32 years), this has been the refrain in certain circles of Christianity: We are living in the "End Times".  I would make the argument that we have been living in the "End Times" ever since Jesus ascended to heaven.  So that means that, as of today, we are indeed closer to "the End".
   Why do so many Christians insist on searching out the final hour?  The scriptures say more than once that it will come "like a thief in the night," i.e. unexpectedly and unknown to us.  Meanwhile our time is spent dissecting the prophecies as if knowing what they mean will help them to be fulfilled.  News flash: God's prophecies are always fulfilled, whether we know about them or not.
   I hate eschatology, I hate the phrase "End Times", and I hate hearing how we're in them.  By all means study the Bible, but remember that there's more important stuff in there than eschatological material.  Some of us need the word of God more for understanding the present than for predicting the future.