About St. Luke's
Prior to the organization of Evangelical St. Luke’s Church in 1884, occasional services of worship were conducted in various homes during the early years of the Civil War and afterward. A “Godly-minded” Methodist farmer provided the spiritual leadership, and through his efforts, people were brought together into an informal religious community.
During the 1870’s, services were conducted and children were baptized by itinerant circuit-rider preachers. Late in 1882, the German Evangelical Synod of North America began to send seminarians and professors to conduct regular services in a school building near the present church site. Finally, on March 2, 1884, Evangelical St. Luke’s was established under the leadership of Jacob Irion of Evangelical St. Paul’s Church in St. Louis with twenty-five charter members. The cornerstone for the first church building was laid on the same day that the congregation was organized. The new building, 24 feet by 36 feet, was dedicated a few months later on Pentecost Sunday, 1884. Within a few years, a parsonage and parochial school building had also been erected on the church grounds.
The gradual growth of the congregation during the mid-1920’s made it
necessary to build a new and larger house of worship.
The present church
building was dedicated on June 17, 1928. Subsequent building projects
included a new parsonage (1952), an educational building (1962), and
a
new church garage (1991).
We owe much to the many generations of families and to the many pastors who have served Evangelical St. Luke’s (now St. Luke’s United Church of Christ) in the 100+ years of the congregation’s existence. We fully expect this cooperation between laity and clergy to continue to guide our church into the future.