I wake up when by body wakes me.

I get out of bed because I have obligations.

I fulfill my obligations because I value being a person who works hard.

I work hard because I want to accomplish something.

I want to accomplish something because I have a dream.

I have a dream because I have hope.

And I have hope because nothing else can motivate me to dream of a world in which all are fed their fill and justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

I have hope because the truth of the kindom is visible to me and I want it to be here now; I want it to be already; I want it to have been here yesterday.

I have hope because nothing else will put my foot in front of the other and nothing else will get me out of a warm and comfortable bed where dreams are vague and ethereal and drift in and out of my near waking.

But the dreams of GOD are not pie-in-the-sky and unattainable; dreams of peace and equality and living in sufficiency. They are anything but unrealistic.

Dreams are the fruit of a potential reality. That they are dreams is proof of the real we choose.

GOD’s dreams are the very definition of reality for those who hope so that they can dream. And dream so that they can accomplish. And accomplish so that they might work. And work so that they might fulfill obligations. And fulfill obligations so that they get out of bed in the morning. And they get out of bed in the morning because they have awoken from dreams, terrible dreams of inequality and injustice; of death and abuse; of intolerance and bigotry.

And when they wake, they say:

This is our world and I believe we can change it together.