Real Time Believers Retired
Today marks the end of an era in my online activities. Seven years ago today - that is, May 20, 2007 - I registered the domain name www.realtimebelievers.com, bought a hosting plan, and set up a relatively simple phpBB forum as a temporary home for the displaced users of the Real Time Faith message board.
Real Time Faith (RTF) was the lively and global online community for Adventist teenagers connected with the Real Time Faith Sabbath School lessons and promoted in the Guide magazine. I had joined RTF in December 2002 and was asked to be a moderator the next month. For six and a half years, I worked with Adventist youth from all over the global, answering their questions, studying the Bible with them, always pointing them back to Christ, and doing my best to be a godly role model.
In May 2007, suddenly and without much forewarning, the owners of Real Time Faith decided to close down the message board. There was no place for the hundred youth to turn to online, so I created Real Time Believers (RTB). My intention for the new forum was to be simply a temporary home until a new online community for Adventist youth was created, as there were rumors that the North American Division was planning such a thing. Eventually, they did reveal Adventist Youth Space, an interactive community built on the Ning platform and currently gone. The youth of RTB, however, did not transition over to the new site. They preferred the environment of RTB. As the years passed, fewer and fewer new members signed up and the site went quiet as the older members went off to college, graduated from college, married, and continued living their lives.
Meanwhile, I used the RTB hosting plan to create a Christian blog called UNashamed. I kept the RTB forum accessible for awhile, just in case any of the old users wanted to pop in to say hello or reminisce by browsing old posts. However, today is the day that Real Time Believers officially retires. The domain name has expired and the purpose of the site has changed. All of us RTBers will take with us many fond memories, and I am honored that I was able to help guide so many youth in their walk with Christ. It was a beautiful, powerful ministry, but it is time to look to the future and new endeavors that Lord has in store.