each lancet-arched leaded window with an ogee header painted with a New Testament scene, one light depicting Christ "The Good Shepherd" relating to John 10:1–21, the other  “Behold I stand at the door and knock” Revelation 3:20, the Christ figure standing at a threshold, a garden behind Him and holding a lit lantern; both lights with the figures set within an abundant garden within Gothic architectural borders, the original window dedication is given below to the Todd family of Sunderland in 1915 and 1922.

 

One of the two lights is a rendition of Holman Hunt’s “The Light of the World”. Hunt’s oil painting, a pre-Raphaelite interpretation of Revelations 3:20 “Behold I stand at the door and knock…”, had a clamorous reception in Victorian times (and he was to twice reproduce it subsequently). The original version, painted in the early 1850’s, now hangs in the chapel at Keble College Oxford; it is said that Hunt found the correct light in the gardens of the Oxford University Press in order to paint it.

Henry Albert Payne (1868-1940) a master Arts and Crafts stained glass artist from the Birmingham School took Hunt’s image and reproduced it, in at least two locations, from 1922 – it translates wonderfully into stained glass with the lantern-light uplighting Christ’s face. It seems the same cartoon, or a version of it, was employed by Atkinsons soon after for the creation of the Sunderland window where it was paired by The Good Shepherd in a similar style. The glass itself is distinctive and is the produce of the celebrated Hartley Wood glass manufacturer in Sunderland.

It may be significant that work by Henry Payne can be found at St Andrew’s Church at Roker, just across the Wear from Thornhill Methodist Church. St Andrews is a church described as one of the masterpieces of the Arts and Crafts “free” style in church architecture. It is an extraordinary building of 1904-7 complete with Burne-Jones tapestry, a Thompson of Kilburn pulpit, carvings by Eric Gill …and the stained glass East Window (and more) by Payne. The proximity of the two churches may well be a connection and may have inspired the choice for the dedicated window at Thornhill Methodist Church in the manner of Henry Payne. The architectural margins, and the Book of Revelations theme, are both matched in the other windows at Thornhill Methodist Church rendered in the Atkinsons Brothers’ more usual workshop style (also available).

The Thornhill Methodist Church of Burn Park Road, Sunderland was built 1902-1903 by TR Millburn and JE Miller; it later became known as Burn Park Road Methodist Church and has now sold and has been de-consecrated. The Millburns went on to build the Empire Theatre in Sunderland.