Vahastu kirik (Vahastu, Rapla County)

 temple, church, christianity, Gothic revival (architecture), interesting place, listed building / architectural heritage, lutheran church/kirk, historical building, place of worship, tourist attraction, 1883_construction

The church was built in 1787–1816, the cornerstone was laid on May 31, 1787. The stone church was designed by the Riga architect Christoph Haberland. Before that, Valga had only had wooden churches, which tended to be destroyed in wars and fires. The church was built on a former cemetery, next to the later market square; this place has now become the center of Valga. The church was built with donations. The church was roofed over in two years, but due to lack of funds, the completion of the construction was delayed until 1816, when the church bell tower was completed. Emperor Alexander I donated 5,000 rubles, and the church was completed and consecrated on September 3, 1816. In 2016, the 200th anniversary of Valga's St. John's Church was celebrated. The patrons of the St. John's congregation of the Valga city church were: Wilken Werneken (1541), Martin Libius (1647–1654), Joachim Kaibelius (d. 1674), Joachim Reibel (1664), Johan Gerngross (1675), David Reineke (..–1704[, Zacharias Piehl (1722–), Joseph Leopold Blida (d. 1766), Ambrosius Mielchen 1754 (d. 1767), Johann Bernhard Grüner(t) 1767 (b. 1737), Joh. Gottlob (Wilhelm?) Preuss, 1798–1823. The church was originally used by the German St. John's congregation, after which the church is named. Manors of the Luke parish and Valga on the 1904 map. Extract from the map "Wegekarte des Walkschen Kreises mit den Kirchspiels- und Gutsgrenzen" (1904) In 1823, the Luke and Valga congregations were united, Luke and Valga remained two independent congregations, and each church had one teacher. Since 1823, the Valga congregation has been served by teachers from the Luke congregation: Johann Lorenz Schatz (1812–1839), Ernst Theodor Hellmann (1839–1848), Emil Georg Hermann Sokolovsky (1849–1852), Piers Hermann Otto (1853–1869), Heinrich Christian Gustav Kupffer (1869–1890) the dean of Valga, the teacher of St. John's, Paul Dietrich (1890–1915), Julius Kuptsch (1915–1918), Nikolai Bäuerle (1919–1920), Karlis Vehmans (1920–1929), Edgars Jundzis (1929–1938, the last teacher of the St. John's congregation). When more Estonians began to come to Valga later, the In 1880, the Estonian Peetri congregation, which initially operated as an auxiliary congregation next to the Jaani congregation. On October 25, 1908, the Estonian Peetri congregation became independent. Since there were also Latvians in Valga, the Latvian Luke or Lugaž congregation was also in the same church, which later moved to the Valka Katariina Church, which was a rural church at the time (the Valga Jaani Church was a city church). Currently, the Valga Jaani Church is used by the Valga Peetri-Luke congregation of the EELK. Historically, the current name of the congregation was the names of the Estonian and Latvian congregations.