any wood finishing gurus around? I need help matching a finish?

I'm working on a project for my church where I need to reshape and refinish a couple of pew ends. Its pretty important to me to match the color and character of the finish to the rest of the pews.

I've already matched the color using stain on a test piece but it doesn't look right. The walnut stain darkens the red oak grain far more than the rest of the wood, completely out of character with the rest of the pews, which have a very even color.

I don't know what all was applied over the years to the other pews, but they started out with something like a golden oak stain and then someone darkened them. I think to match the character I need to use a pigmented finish as opposed to stain and clear finish. Any ideas on either what was used to darken the pews or what I could use to finish them to match the very even walnut tone?