Emmanuel Portadown was birthed in December 2017 and was planted out of our mother-church Emmanuel Lurgan, inspired by our vision to rewrite the story of our City, Craigavon.
The wider Craigavon area is centred around two main towns, Lurgan and Portadown, and the initial concept of creating the new city of Craigavon in the 1960s involved joining Lurgan and Portadown together into one large city. While many parts of this project failed to live up to the original aspiration, the dream of a flourishing City in this area is something we as a church feel strongly God wants to redeem.
After years of planting and establishing Emmanuel Lurgan and witnessing a measure of breakthrough in that town we sensed the Spirit prompt us that it was time to now plant a stalk of who we are into Portadown. During a year of prayerful discernment and prayer-walking parts of the town the Lord confirmed His plans, through the scriptures and prophetic words, for us to establish a church in Portadown.
One of these confirmations involved a conversation with our long-standing friends and partners in Upper Bann Vineyard, who shared the same vision for Portadown and for the City of Craigavon. As we continued to have honest and open conversations with the leadership of Upper Bann Vineyard it became clear that after 10 years of planting and building church in Portadown, the leadership and members of Upper Bann Vineyard Church would graft-in to the new thing God was doing in Emmanuel Portadown.
While these were unconventional beginnings we knew the Spirit was asking us to enter into sacrificial and joy-filled unity together, as a prophetic symbol of what He is doing in the City. Since these beginnings God has been doing beautiful things amongst us as we have grown in depth and numbers! We believe Emmanuel Portadown will mature as a healthy local church serving the people of Portadown but also, in strategic partnership with Emmanuel Lurgan, as a significant resource church, serving our vision of City-wide transformation.
For the first two years Emmanuel Portadown we were located in the High Street Mall and enjoyed special times of worship, building community and serving the people of our town.