Alone in my room
For more than a dozen years, I have spent my days in a 10 x 12 foot room on the third floor of the triplex owned by my parents, who run a business on the first floor. I am otherwise alone in the building. It may sound a bit like prison but it’s actually my haven: my office, crafts studio and recreation room all in one. 
Naturally an introvert and fairly disciplined, I’ve never reconsidered my decision to work at home. I enjoy the quiet and the solitude, which help me focus and be creative, whether I’m writing an article or designing a baby quilt. However, the distinct lack of face-to-face interaction with coworkers, employers, suppliers, or customers greatly reduces the potential of meeting people with whom I can share my faith and be a witness.
How do I reconcile this with my passion for evangelism and local missions? How can I tell others about Christ when I spend 80 to 90 per cent of the average weekday by myself?
Don't dismiss church
Plugging into the ministry of my home church provides many opportunities for me to share my faith:
I taught Sunday School for about 20 years and am certain that a good number of my students over that time did not come from Christian homes and were hearing about Jesus and His love for the first time. Just because you’re telling the stories of Jesus in a church classroom and not in an overseas orphanage,it doesn’t mean you’re not doing missions!
Every time a visitor walks into church and I make the effort to welcome and befriend that person, I could be unknowingly sharing God’s love with someone who has never experienced it before.
As our church’s clerk, I send out a letter to all our first-timers, which allows me to offer a word of encouragement and to invite them back to church.
Then there’s my involvement with our young adults and women’s ministries.
We also have a monthly tract distribution project that I have participated in for over 10 years. It may not sound like much – handing out pamphlets to downtown shoppers as they rush past – but Montreal churches have seen the positive results of this form of evangelism and it excites me to be one of the many seed-sowers in this spiritually starving city.
Who are the people in your neigbhourhood?
When Jesus taught us to be good neighbours, He probably wasn’t being literal about the people who live next door, but that’s a good place to start if, like me, a large part of your world lies within a two-block radius of your home.
I am slowly developing relationships with the tenants who rent my three apartment units. One in particular, a young mother, has attended three card-making sessions with me at the home of another Christian friend, where she has enjoyed meeting several other Christians. Our one-hour-each-way trips to these classes has started to open doors for discussing our respective faith backgrounds. Another tenant, a lapsed Catholic, has accepted two invitations to church events.
Down the street, the young woman who photocopies our church bulletins every week has added me to her Facebook friends list, which brings me to another point . . .
Social media
While I would never suggest that someone sign up for Facebook if he or she is not already using it, as I don’t want to become a promoter of the Internet site, I believe that Christians who use Facebook can use it as a means of sharing their faith.
Below my profile picture is a declaration of my relationship with Jesus Christ and I regularly share reflections, praise items, Scripture verses or insightful quotes that I hope will encourage and inspire the friends who read them. I am careful never to post photos that might harm my testimony and I try to avoid conversations that don’t glorify the Lord. I pay attention to what my non-Christian friends or family members share so that I can prayerfully respond with God’s love when it seems appropriate.
I have had to learn to expand my idea of how, where and when Christians can engage in missions and witnessing; it can be done in any number of ways, as long as we’re available, prepared, and following the direction of the Holy Spirit.
