A stone church is thought to have stood at Rinna from the early 1200s, first documented in surviving records in 1382, though a fire at the neighbouring rectory in 1760 destroyed much of the parish's early archive. By the late 1700s the old church was judged too small and outdated, prompting decades of debate over a replacement.
The architect Olof Tempelman, of the Royal Superintendent's Office, produced several designs between 1788 and 1799, each rejected by parishioners as too costly until a simplified plan was finally approved. Building work, overseen by master builder Casper Seurling of Linköping, was carried out around 1800–1802 (sources differ slightly on the exact building years), with villagers contributing materials, labour and gifts including bricks, roof shingles and a silver jug.
The resulting whitewashed, neoclassical building has a single nave, a straight-ended chancel with a semicircular sacristy extension, and a west tower with a lantern. Inside, the barrel-vaulted ceiling and large round-arched windows create the spacious, temple-like character typical of the Gustavian style, and the church is regarded as one of Sweden's best-preserved examples of this period.
Among the fittings, a triumphal crucifix from the mid-1300s, depicting the suffering Christ, survives from the medieval church and is attributed to a workshop associated with Linköping Cathedral. The altarpiece, showing the Ascension, was painted by Pehr Hörberg around 1802–1803 and later heavily restored in 1881. The octagonal font, decorated with foliage, birds, a stag and small figures, came from Johan Silfverling's stonemasonry workshop in Vadstena and was donated by a local couple in 1691.
Other notable survivals include a fragment of a runestone found built into the churchyard wall — the only one known from Rinna — along with a bridal pew and a set of stocks kept in the tower chamber. The church's organ has been rebuilt and altered more than once, most substantially in the 1960s, and suffered vandalism damage later repaired in the late 1970s.