Give Me a Year: An Essay for Leaders and Teachers That Labor in Redemptive Love and Sacrifice

By Donetrus G. Hill EdD

Have you ever been stuck to the point of paralysis, where moving just seems to be almost impossible? In Give Me a Year, author Dr. Donetrus G. Hill presents a tool to redefine what’s possible and remove barriers in the face of opportunity.
He offers a refreshingly honest depiction of how life’s perils are designed to build character and strength. Hill encourages, empowers, and energizes you through knowledge, faith, and testimony, providing guidance to rediscovery and self-realization.
Give Me a Year implores you to follow your dreams, go for your goals, and be bold and consistent in your quest to accomplish the most outlandish of aspirations. It encourages you to live out loud and embrace the things about you that make you, you. Don’t give up on your life, marriage, relationship, children, family, career, degree, ministry, weight-loss goals, writing a book, starting a business, or buying a house.
Praise for Give Me a Year
We are not invincible. We all need balanced, emotional construction, whether temporary or constant. Dr. Donetrus Hill infuses Scripture with his personal narrative to give us strong building blocks for life in Give Me a Year. Opening his own wounds to mirror our own, Hill lets us know that with God’s grace, not giving up on yourself, and learning to love and live is an open road we can all travel. His words bring humor and powerful transparency. It’s a read that has your name on every sentence.
—Marsha Bonhart, Retired Journalist

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: May 29, 2019
• ISBN: 9781973653370

Donetrus G. Hill EdD

Dr. Donetrus Glenn Hill is a native of Saginaw, Michigan, but was raised in Shreveport, Louisiana. He is the son of Lillian and Donald. He has one younger sibling, Rondray. Donetrus shares life with the most phenomenal woman on the planet, Cornelia. Together, they share the joy of raising their amazing son, Roman. They have special children in Rhema, Calvin, Roget, Terrance, Kevin, and Carlton. Dr. Hill is a graduate of Wiley College, where he completed his bachelors of science degree in biology and furthered his education by obtaining a masters of science in sports medicine from the United States Sports Academy and a doctorate in educational leadership and management from Capella University, where he was an honor graduate with distinction. His research design was centered on the cultivation of scholarly outcomes for at-risk and disenfranchised students. Dr. Hill is a licensed minister that has delivered messages to various churches across the United States. Dr. Hill is a certified science teacher in the state of Texas, is a nationally certified principal in Texas and Ohio, and is a licensed superintendent in the state of Ohio. Dr. Hill is also nationally certified by the Center for Teacher Effectiveness to provide technical assistance in classroom management and differentiated instruction. Dr. Hill has conducted seminars and presentations to diverse crowds of educators both nationally and internationally.

Book preview

Copyright © 2019 Donetrus G. Hill, EdD.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

WestBow Press

A Division of Thomas Nelson & Zondervan

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.westbowpress.com

1 [phone]

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Scripture taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

ISBN: 978-1-9736-5336-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-5338-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-5337-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019901660

WestBow Press rev. date: 5/15/2019

I dedicate

this book and all future publications to the memory of sportscaster, journalist, son, and my younger brother, Rondray Latrell Hill.

August 1, 1980–May 25, 2002

Your life will continue to evolve with each volume this family commits to print!

Signature Page

Let me be the first to say, Happy New Year!

Give Me a Year lives boldly in you!

My Greatest Inspiration

To Cornelia and Roman. The both of you have selflessly given up so much for me to complete this volume. I now give this testament back to the both of you.

The two of you are my greatest inspiration.

Let’s have an amazing year for the rest of our lives!

Contents

Foreword

Introduction: Give Me a Year

Life Declaration I     Don’t Overthink It

Life Declaration II    Don’t Live in Fear

Life Declaration III   Reject Reproach

Until Next Time

Reflections and Declarations

About the Author

Consultation Services

wa1.png

Foreword

God speaks to us in divers manners and in many instances. While we are experiencing a moment of despondency, perhaps that’s the time our sensitivity to the Spirit is keenest, and God can download into us His perfect plan for our lives.

Dr. Hill shares his heart about God’s leading, as well as His plan and purpose for his life. Oftentimes God causes us to remember a scripture and reflect on the moment of the test, and that causes us to rejoice and celebrate its revelation for our lives, opening a vast new season for our lives.

A year is divided into four seasons, and each season has its implications in our lives. Many of us need to experience the four seasons of life to recover from the failures, defeats, and bitterness of our past. I call this the miracle of the second chance. Give Me a Year will bless your life. Read it and meditate on it. Allow the Holy Spirit to reveal your potential, abilities, giftings, and anointings that are lying dormant in your life. Take another year to break up the fallow ground, sow good seeds, and germinate into a new life.

And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, and bring forth his fruit in his season, his leaf also shall not wither, and whatever he doeth shall prosper. (Psalm 1:3)

Give me another year—my season of productivity and truth in the year.

It is my desire that this book will stir you to move forward into your new year of destiny.

Bishop Truman L. Martin, DDS

October 2018

wa1.png

Introduction: Give Me a Year

It was a cold February afternoon in Dayton Ohio—Super Bowl Sunday, to be exact. I placed an announcement on Facebook letting my followers know I was going live at 2:00 p.m. EST. I was building my audience. I had enough sense to know when you have something to say, you need people to listen—just as when you are a leader, there must be a collection of followers. If you look behind and see no one is there, whom or what are you leading? But it’s too early to get into that type of thinking. Let me continue to set the stage for Give Me a Year.

Before I get too far ahead of myself, I deem it necessary to take you back to January 7, 2018, the first Sunday of the new year. It snowed all night, leaving a silky canvas of white on the trees and yards. Truly a majestic sight to see, but not to drive on. I got up that morning and debated with myself as to whether or not I was going to place my precious Cadillac on those icy, freshly salted roads or watch a sermon on the Internet. Unfortunately, there was no anointing on the Internet, and so I knew I had to get out in the elements. But the one thing about elements is if used correctly, they give and