Western Theological Seminary

Walking the Sabbath Way: Living and Leading Within the Rhythms of Grace

What is a Doctor of Ministry?

The Doctor of Ministry program equips participants to develop their ministerial knowledge and skills, preparing them for meaningful service in congregational, parachurch, and missionary contexts.

The Doctor of Ministry program emphasizes the integration of practical ministry, academic learning, and thoughtful reflection within a supportive community of peers. Guided by a dedicated mentor, each three-year cohort engages in a carefully structured curriculum centered on a timely and relevant area of study. Through collaboration with faculty and fellow students, participants have the flexibility to shape their learning in ways that are most meaningful to their ministry context.

The Walking the Sabbath Way Doctor of Ministry track is open to anyone who loves God, desires to live into more sustainable life rhythms, and longs to explore this in community with others who are similarly bumbling their way toward wholeness. The Doctor of Ministry is a ministry degree, and its purpose is to form people in lives of service to God, the church, and the world. You don’t need to be in a full-time vocational ministry to apply, but do expect a level of theological and spiritual reflection on themes inherent to lives devoted to ministering to a broken and hurting world.

About This Cohort

In the biblical imagination, Sabbath is a practice that enables a rhythm of life that leads to the flourishing of family, neighborhood, and all of creation. It is the taproot nourishing the Gospel, whose branches are justice, whose leaves are delight, and whose fruit is shalom.

Sabbath is not an add-on to an otherwise busy, distracted, or overwhelmed life, but is life’s core organizing principle, the metronome by which our lives fall in step with the Spirit. As Abraham Joshua Heschel put it, Sabbath is “not an interlude but the climax of living.”

It is also radically counter-cultural, a weekly protest against the formative powers of a culture steeped in speed, scarcity, productivity, achievement, and exclusion. Ironically, practicing Sabbath today is really hard work. And this is as true for those in full-time ministry as it is for those in business or industry.

This Doctor of Ministry cohort will provide leaders in various forms of ministry a space to both explore and experience the transformative potential of Sabbath, in their personal and professional lives. We will explore Sabbath rhythms not as utopian and unattainable visions of luxury or privilege, and equally not as an abstract theory or a “good idea,” but as a life vision grounded in flourishing and rooted in the warp and woof of our real lives in ministry and with family and friends. We will imagine together a way of reorienting our lives with God toward something that is slower, more intentional, more delight-filled, more abundant, more vital.

Download Learning Sequence

Get to Know Cohort Mentor Dr. Travis West

Travis West is Professor of Hebrew and Old Testament

at Western Theological Seminary. His most recent book, The Sabbath Way, prompted him to offer this Doctor of Ministry cohort. His previous books, Biblical Hebrew: An Interactive Approach and The Art of Biblical Performance, advocate for incorporating performance, embodiment, and play into the process of learning biblical Hebrew and interpreting biblical stories.

When he's away from the classroom and the writing

desk, he can be found searching for wonder while walking the fields near his house, going to a farmers' market, watching a movie, or spending time with his wife, who is his most consistent source of delight and amazement.

Guest Lecturers

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer is a poet, teacher, speaker, and writing facilitator who co-hosts Emerging Form, a podcast on creative process. Her daily audio series, The Poetic Path, is on the Ritual app. Her poems have appeared on A Prairie Home Companion, PBS News Hour, O Magazine, Washington Post’s Book Club, and the Carnegie Hall stage. Her recent collections are All the Honey and The Unfolding. In 2024, she became poet laureate for Evermore, helping others explore grief and love through poetry. Since 2006, she’s written a poem a day, sharing them on her blog, A Hundred Falling Veils. One-word mantra: Adjust.

Ruth Haley Barton

Ruth Haley Barton has been a student, a practitioner and a leader in the area of Christian spirituality and spiritual formation for over twenty years. She is the founding President and CEO of The Transforming Center, a non-profit dedicated to creating space for God to strengthen leaders and transform communities. In addition to being a spiritual director and sought-after speaker and retreat leader, she is the author of many books, including Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership, An Invitation to Retreat, Sacred Rhythms, and, particularly relevant for our work together in this cohort, Embracing Rhythms of Work and Rest: From Sabbath to Sabbatical and Back Again.

Randy and Edith Woodley

Randy and Edith Woodley are the founders and directors of Eloheh Indigenous Center for Earth Justice and Eloheh Farm & Seeds. Randy is Distinguished Professor of Faith and Culture Emeritus at George Fox University/Portland Seminary. His expertise has been sought in national venues as diverse as Time Magazine, The New York Times, Politifact, Christianity Today, The Huffington Post and Planet Drum: A Voice for Bioregional, Sustainability. He has written many books, including Shalom and the Community of Creation, Becoming Rooted, and Indigenous Theology and the Western Worldview, and, co-written with his wife Edith, Journey to Eloheh.

Important Dates

Apply by July 1, 2026

The application and all supplemental material must be submitted by the due date.

The Doctor of Ministry application includes:

Three recommendation forms
One letter of ecclesial endorsement
Two personal statements
One academic writing sample
Official Transcripts from previous educational institutions

If you have questions about your application, contact our admissions team at admissions@westernsem.edu.

Projected Seminar Dates

The cohort will begin in October 2026, with seminars scheduled each Fall and Spring until graduation in April 2029. Each semester of the three-year program, we will gather in person to foster sustained, focused, and intensive conversation, research, connection, and play. Below are the tentative dates and locations for our six-weeklong seminars.

Year One: Living the Sabbath Way

October 26-30, 2026, in Holland, MI

May 10-14, 2027, in Holland, MI

Year Two: Leading the Sabbath Way

September/October 2027 in Holland, MI

May/June 2028–Walk the Camino de Santiago, Spain

Year Three: Articulating the Sabbath Way

September/October 2028–Possible Writing Retreat Off-Campus

April 2029 (Dissertation Defense and Celebration) in Holland, MI

Ready to take the next step?

Start your application today.

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