Plucking Prejudice

Getting 30 people from one country to another is as complicated as it sounds, but after being spread throughout Ukraine in our different teams, coming back together and seeing familiar faces feels like a breath of fresh air…even at 5 in the morning in the Ukrainian airport. Fast forward to the next day; it’s been 20+ hours of travel from Ukraine to Jordan and we arrived around 3 am. A sleep-deprived, World Racer on travel day can be a sight to see…

M Squad arrived in Jordan.                         Tired is an understatement.

Our team finally made it to our hostel and yes I went STRAIGHT to bed. Thankfully the only thing on next day’s agenda was to rest and adventure at my leisure. As soon as I stepped foot out of my hostel’s building, I was greeted with colorful streets, the fragrance of spices foreign to my nose, and a thousand different sounds that made up the heartbeat of the city. This is when I first experienced love at first sight for a country. 

    Right outside our hostel in Amman

There was beautiful, loose-leaf tea in every shop

Before we get into the next section of the blog, I’d like to preface that I am not an expert on Islam and/or muslim culture. This is written from the perspective of my experiences. 

Jordan is predominantly a muslim country and the state religion is Islam. In the religion of Islam, most women wear a head covering called a hijab as a form of modesty and other reasonings. Hijab is the general term for ‘veil’ or ‘to cover’ and it is used to cover a woman’s hair, ears, and neck, but not the face. There are also other forms of coverings that women wear throughout different middle-eastern countries and even within the country of Jordan such as a niqab. A niqab is a covering women wear that covers everything except their eyes and is often worn with a loose black garment (abaya) that covers from head to feet. As I walked throughout the city of Amman, I noticed women with hijabs, women with niqabs, and women with no head covering at all. 

Examples of different traditional veils. 

Quickly, I realized that anytime I was near a woman wearing a niqab, a wave of fear and hesitancy clouded over my heart. My irrational but honest, natural instinct was to avoid any type of interaction with these women. To be honest, I was confused with myself. I did not understand why I felt this way.

“Lord, why am I scared of these women? They’ve done nothing to me and you love them just as much as you love me…” 

Not to mention, I am here for the sole purpose of Love and to Love others so I asked the Lord to really search my heart and find the root of this fear and because He is faithful, He did just that.

You see, I barely made it, but I am a “90’s” baby and although I was raised in Honduras for the first 9 years of my life, my mom and grandpa are from New York and my grandma lived there for over 15 years of her life so New York is a big piece of my family. When the Twin Towers were attacked, it affected my family more than I realized at the time. Unfortunately, because of the tragedy that happened on September 11th, I believe it affected some people’s view on the entire muslim community in a negative way. I am not saying that I was raised to hate this community, but the air was polluted with an underlying assumption that I should fear the muslim community and culture. Out of that, prejudice over this specific group of people was instilled in me at a very young age. It’s shocking to recognize how such a small seed can be embedded in your heart without your knowledge and how much of a stronghold it can have, even after many years have passed. I was unsure of what to do with this realization, but I serve a God that knows my own heart better than I do so going to my Heavenly Father seemed like it made the most sense.  

“Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me”

Psalms 51:10

The Lord used my time in Jordan to pluck out this seed of fear and prejudice. After repentance, He redeemed something I didn’t even know needed redemption. Through Him, my empathy grew and I was able to view this community with a lens closer to the Father’s heart. As Christians, we are called to imitate Christ and I am so thankful God does not let us walk through life alone. He is there every step of the way and knows what we need before we do.

He knew that this prejudice lived in me and He still loves me whole.

He knew that in 19 years He was going to uproot it. 

He knew that at 22 years-old, I would be in Jordan facing this. 

And because He loves me, He knew that He would redeem it and change my heart all for His glory. 

I believe it is important to recognize that as Christians, we are nowhere near perfect and there will be times we miss the mark. There will be things in us that are not of God and need to be uprooted. Perhaps even things we don’t even realize are there. BUT, God knows they are and He will not let us stay there if we are willing. His love is never failing. 

Thank you so much for reading!! God did a lot in Jordan so be on the look out for my next blog because there is more to come…

Until next time amigos, 

Gina Oyuela-Dickinson:)