First let me explain what is meant by the end times. The 'end times' is a reference to the end of time remaining before the lord Jesus returns to remove the christians (his believers and followers) out of the world before the 7 year tribulation starts. Whenever normal every day life is threatened by something abnormal such as a massive earthquake, meteor shower, war, famine, or something else, there was always someone who thought or said 'surely this must be the end times!', this type of thinking has happened from right after Christ died on the cross over 2000 years ago, until present day.

These people surely did not read or study the bible, for if they had then they would of known that the end times could of not been here or had not even started, not until at least the year 1948. Once the year 1948 arrived, a great thing occurred that started what I call the 'winding of the prophetic clock key' this event was the creation of the independant state of 'Israel'.

Jesus talks about the end times in the bible and says that when the fig tree blossoms the end is near. Jesus used the descriptive analogy of a "fig tree" as pertaining to Israel, to instruct his disciples about how we could discern the timeliness of his return. Before 1948 there was no Independent state or nation of Israel.

Another thing Jesus tells us will signal the closeness of the end times is that Jerusalem will be controlled by the Jews. Since 400 B.C. the city of Jerusalem has been controlled by one Gentile superpower after another. Here are a few of the dates when Jerusalem was under control of forces other than the Jews: A.D. 70, the Romans; 614 the Persians; 637 Caliph Omar; 1099 the Crusaders; 1187 Saladin; 1250 the Egyptian Mamelukes; 1517 the Turks; 1917 the British and others, then in 1967 during the 6th day war from June 5 to 10 of that year the jews captured Jerusalem. Jewish control of Jerusalem is one of the most important signs because of Jesus’ statement in Luke 21:24. The disciples had asked Him, "When are you going to return and what will be the sign ?" Jesus replied, "Jerusalem shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled." What was the Savior saying? Simply that the Jews would be scattered throughout the world and the city of Jerusalem controlled by Gentile powers until the time of His return. All the various Gentile groups—the Romans, the Persians, the Crusaders, the Egyptians, and others controlled Jerusalem from A.D. 70 until May 1967. Then, in June 1967 the Jews took control of Jerusalem for the first time in more than nineteen hundred years.

The disciples also asked jesus, not only what the signs would be that signal the countdown to his return, but also what ucdm  signs of the actual end times would be. There are many signs we are told that we will see in the last days just before jesus returns, they include:

Earthquakes - Famines - Pestilences - Signs in space (sun, moons, stars, planets) Luke 21:11 (King James Version) - "And great earthquakes shall be in divers (various, several) places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven."

Famines:Since 1975 to present, there has never been a year, that there wasn't a famine some place on the earth.

Earthquakes:

Earthquakes are happening more frequently and are getting stronger. From 1920 - 1990 a period of 70 years, there was 10 Major Quakes. From 1990 - 2005 a period of 15 years, there was 15 Major Quakes. And this is only the major quakes, in the year 2000 there were 22,256 total earthquakes detected. In 2004 there was 31,199. of course most were not even hardly noticed or occurred in unpopulated areas, but there numbers are growing rapidly every year, as well as the major quakes.

The United Nations Inter-Agency Task Force on Disaster Reduction Just reported that between 1950 to 1959 there was 20 Major calamities costing $38 Million (1989 Dollar Value), in 1990 to 1999 there was 82 Major calamities costing $535 Billion.

Pestilences:

Since the 1980's to present the number of new diseases that have formed is incredible. We now have SARS - AIDS - Herpes - West Nile - New Drug resistant TB - Mad Cow - New monkey pox virus with human-to-human transmission - and now the H5N1 (avian bird flu).

Data shows that both the incidence and severity of outbreaks of multi-drug-resistant pathogens have experienced a sharp upturn within the past 10 years. For example, Salmonella infections have gone up 25-fold in some countries in Europe since 1998. Similar increases are reported for haemorrhagic E. coli 0157 food poisoning: between 2002 and 2005, the frequency of infection increased 10 - fold in England and Wales, and 100 - fold in Scotland.