At 3:45am on Monday, I hit the road for Charlotte’s 14th Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Prayer Breakfast. Kweisi Mfume, former President/CEO of NAACP and five term Democratic Congressman from Maryland, delivered the keynote address to a large and diverse crowd.After the breakfast, we hustled over to Winston-Salem to march in memory of the life and legacy of Dr. King. The march was reminiscent of those I watched as a kid in the 1960s - full of passion and hope for a more tolerant America. My son, Winston, supporters of our campaign and I marched alongside the Forsyth County Democrats, who were ably led by County Chair Fleming El-Amin. I was particularly encouraged by the turnout of young people - many from Winston-Salem State University, where I’ll soon be visiting in early February.

Moving onward to Greensboro, I attended an extraordinary tribute to Dr. King at St. James Presbyterian Church. I was greeted with dignity and grace by the Rev. Dr. Diana L. Givens Moffett and members of the African American community from all over the Triad. Rev. Moffett’s sermon challenged the congregation to dream - dream about the future of our nation, as a young Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once dared us to do.

Later that evening, I attended a service at Union Baptist Church led by the Reverend Kenneth Ray Hammond. His sermon was extraordinarily stirring, driving the assembled to our feet in response to his call to get up and get energized. Moreover, the ringing voicing of the Durham MLK Young Choir and the Durham MLK Community Celebration Choir uplifted the service.

The common theme invoked across all of these celebrations was one of hope for the future. But hope, of course, does not equal actual change, as the Rev. Dr. J. R. Manley, spiritual leader of First Baptist Church, had reminded attendees of The Martin Luther King, Kr. Memorial Banquet the previous evening in Chapel Hill: “He didn’t just wish for change, he changed things.”

Now is the time to change things in this state and this country. And with your combined voices, we’ll do just that.