{"id":19313,"date":"2026-04-25T00:01:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T23:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/?p=19313"},"modified":"2026-04-01T16:35:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T15:35:13","slug":"prayer-for-the-week-saturday-25th-april-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/25\/prayer-for-the-week-saturday-25th-april-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Prayer for the Week – Saturday 25th April 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Prayer for the Week\u00a0 April 25<\/strong><\/p>\n

Read John 10: 1-18\u00a0\u00a0 The Shepherd and His Flock<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

We are very excited in the Darlington District as several of our churches have been exhibiting the Knitted Bible recently and this week<\/strong> my own chapel at Barnard Castle is hosting the exhibition<\/strong>.\u00a0 Some of you may have seen the exhibition elsewhere as this popular traveling display, featuring 36 hand-knitted scenes from the Old & New Testament, seems to hurtle up and down the country?\u00a0 It was beautifully crafted & created by members of St George\u2019s URC in Hartlepool and launched in 2008.\u00a0 We are inviting all the children from local nurseries and schools and their parents, locals and passing tourists\u00a0 to come into our church, in the centre of this very rural market town (made famous during the pandemic by Dominic Cummings\u2019 visit,) to discover Bible stories in a new way and to meet our church family.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s good to look at Bible stories in a new and fresh way, we often discover something we have missed, not understood fully, or have simply passed over previously.\u00a0 I\u2019m not very good at re-reading a book or novel I have already read.\u00a0 But not so with the Bible, even though I have been seriously studying & then preaching for over 20 years I am a long way off knowing all the scriptures or understanding all the depth of wisdom within its pages, even a life time will not be long enough. \u00a0But in this passage recorded by John we are given such assurance by Jesus\u2019 words. Vs 7, \u201cI tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep.\u201d\u00a0 Vs 9, \u201cI am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.\u201d\u00a0 Vs 14, \u201cI am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me \u2013 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father \u2013 and I lay down my life for the sheep.\u201d (NIV)<\/p>\n

The parable of the good shepherd in John 10 likens Jesus to a shepherd who acts as the gateway to abundant life for his sheep. The shepherd lying across the gate is the gateway to life, a shepherd who lies down and stands up regularly, a movement that in this Gospel symbolises the flow of heavenly grace through the Word made flesh, who is now close to the Father\u2019s heart.<\/p>\n

Prayer<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lord, we thank you for calling us here regularly.<\/p>\n

To this place where we can tune into your voice<\/p>\n

and drown out the din of the world\u2019s voices.<\/p>\n

We praise you for the deep knowledge we have of you,<\/p>\n

as your spirit guides and enlightens us to become a<\/p>\n

trusting flock of our Good Shepherd.<\/p>\n

Thank you, Lord Jesus, for teaching us<\/p>\n

to hear your voice in the Gospels<\/p>\n

and in the stillness of our personal prayer.<\/p>\n

Good Shepherd, may we ever raise our voices in praise,<\/p>\n

to the one whose firm, gentle command<\/p>\n

is our gateway to life in all its abundant fullness. Amen.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Hymn<\/p>\n

Singing the Faith 479 \u00a0\u00a0The King of love my shepherd is\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Henry Williams Baker<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Debs Coggrave – LP in the Darlington and Teesdale Circuit and Trustee for Cumbria, Darlington & Newcastle Districts<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Prayer for the Week\u00a0 April 25 Read John 10: 1-18\u00a0\u00a0 The Shepherd and His Flock We are very excited in the Darlington District as several of our churches have been exhibiting the Knitted Bible recently and this week my own chapel at Barnard Castle is hosting the exhibition.\u00a0 Some of you may have seen the exhibition elsewhere as this popular […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9120,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[349,44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prayer","category-prayer-for-the-week"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-02 14:45:33","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19313"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19313\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19315,"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19313\/revisions\/19315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mwib.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}