Carlton Lee Butts

Reverend Carlton Lee Butts, loving husband and father, 67, of Tampa, Florida was welcomed into the Kingdom of God on February 6th, 2021 after a long hard-fought battle with the complications of COVID. He was a graduate of Plant High School and received his bachelor’s from the University of South Florida and his master’s in Church Music from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Carl served as Minister of Music at Riverside Baptist Church and Tampa Baptist Church until he lost his hearing at age 40. He continued to serve as Music Minister for an additional year before going back to school for computer programming. Carl worked for Duke Energy for 25 years as a Senior Systems Analyst until he retired in October of 2019. Carl and his family attend Idlewild Baptist Church where he volunteered every Sunday with the Special Needs’ Ministry. Carl was a loving, kind, generous and patient man who loved traveling, reading, and mostly spending time with his family. He had many talents including his musical ability, creating stained glass pieces and designing and building whatever his wife could think of. Those he worked with through the years have expressed their respect and admiration for Carl saying their lives were changed by seeing the way he dealt with adversity and still praised God for his blessed life. The most important thing people would say is that he never gave up his faith in God and how he lived his life was his Christian witness.

Preceded in death by his parents James and Doris Butts. He is survived by his wife of 37 years, Vicki H. Butts, and two children Taylor L. Butts who works as a Behavioral Analyst and Trevor A. Butts, who is following in his father’s footsteps with a master’s and doctorate in Music. He is also survived by his sisters Nancy Coryell, Judy Clark, Cheryl Westfall (husband Andrew), as well as many nieces and nephews.

His celebration of life will be held at Idlewild Baptist Church on Friday, February 19, 2021. Visitation will begin at 10:00 am in the church’s foyer and the service will follow at 11:00 am in the worship center. The service will also be on a live stream. The link for the live stream will be provided once available.

The livestream link is https://vimeo.com/event/612595 .