Without Walls Central Church

Carpenter’s Home Church

Without Walls Central Church was a Christian megachurch in Lakeland, Florida, and was the church’s second location. The history of how they came to own this property in Lakeland begins with the Lakeland First Assembly of God, which was founded in 1921, that for decades occupied a stone building near the intersection of Lemon Street and Lake Parker Avenue. In 1964, the Pentecostal church moved to a sanctuary at the corner of North Gary Road and Rose Street.

The church’s modern history, though, began when Karl Strader became senior pastor in 1966. Strader’s tenure saw a period of explosive growth. A 1850-seat sanctuary was built next to the church on Rose Street to accommodate the surge in membership. By 1980, the church had ballooned to 4,000 members and had overgrown its massive sanctuary.

Looking to expand and build a new, even larger sanctuary, the First Assembly of God found 475 acres near Lake Gibson, stretching west to U.S. 98 and south nearly to Interstate 4; property that included the former retirement home for the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America, which had closed in 1976. The church purchased this property, sold all but 125 acres, and began construction in late 1982 on a 155,000-square-foot facility built by Roe Messner with a 10,0000-seat auditorium. The new building opened in 1985, and First Assembly changed its name to Carpenter’s Home Church.

Famous Guests

In its early years, Carpenter’s Home attracted some of the nation’s most prominent evangelical figures, including Rex Humbard, Jimmy Swaggart, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, and Oral Roberts. By 1988, the ministry was reportedly taking in $4.8 million in offerings and operating with a combined $50 million budget that supported the church, retirement home, and school.

Julie Bulloch, who grew up in Lakeland’s First Assembly of God, moved with her family to Carpenter’s Home. She and her husband, Rusty, were slated to be the first couple married in the new church, but construction delays meant they instead became the last couple wed at First Assembly.

The Bullochs—later the focus of a television program about their efforts raising more than 20 young adults at their North Lakeland ranch—led youth ministries at Carpenter’s Home for roughly 15 years.

Controversy

Just a few years after its opening, Carpenter’s Home began to draw negative publicity—and even before the doors officially opened, tragedy struck. In January 1985, a 19-year-old church member fell to his death while helping install sound equipment in the sanctuary.

Construction, overseen by Roe Messner, also left behind serious flaws that would plague the building for decades. Jack Hall, who later hosted church board meetings at his Haines City condominium and acted as an informal caretaker of the property during its abandonment, recalled that a poorly designed drainage system caused persistent leaks almost immediately after completion—problems that were never fully resolved. Hall also noted that the sanctuary’s stained-glass windows were fitted with the wrong exterior panes—clear glass instead of glazed—causing the colors to fade dramatically over time.

In 1989, the church suffered a split when about 800 members left in a dispute over Karl Strader’s leadership. The regional leadership of the Assemblies of God placed Strader on an 18-month probation, citing “errors in judgment, teaching, practice, and personal relationships.” Strader had also long been open to charismatic practices such as spontaneous dancing, singing, and emphasis on prophecy, which many of the church’s more traditional members objected to.

The dispute culminated in a 1989 congregational vote on whether Strader should remain as senior pastor. He survived the challenge by a margin of 854 to 582, but the victory came at a cost: his longtime executive assistant resigned, and a large contingent of members departed to establish a new congregation—Victory Church—which has since grown into one of Polk County’s largest. Carpenter’s Home reportedly had a peak attendance of less than 3,000 after the split.

In 1994, Daniel Strader, one of Karl Strader’s sons, was arrested on fraud charges and was later convicted. Daniel Strader had sold false securities and defrauded investors out of $2.3 million. He was found guilty in 1995 on 238 counts of securities fraud and was sentenced to 45 years’ imprisonment. The severe sentence resulted from applying the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The scandal received considerable media coverage; membership of Carpenter’s Home Church dwindled even further, and it became impossible for the church to maintain its large facilities.

Without Walls Central Church

On August 3, 2002, Without Walls Central Church began renting the building for services. This church was a branch of Randy and Paula White’s Without Walls International Church, headquartered in Tampa. In 2004, Without Walls International Church reported a congregation of 20,000 as the largest congregation in the area, making the church the seventh largest church in the United States. In 2005, the Carpenter’s Home Church property was sold to the Without Walls churches for $8 million in cash.

After the loss of Carpenter’s Home Church, Stephen Strader, who had served as an associate pastor under his father, founded Ignited Church in North Lakeland. That same year, Karl Strader’s son-in-law, the late Shane Simmons, became lead pastor of Auburndale Life Church, a congregation acquired through the 2005 transaction with Without Walls International.

Decline and Closure

Married in 1987, Randy and Paula White divorced in 2007. In 2008, three years after purchasing the former Carpenter’s Home Church, Without Walls International put both the Tampa and Lakeland properties up for sale due to financial difficulties. The Evangelical Christian Credit Union, the California credit union that held the mortgage on the property, began foreclosure proceedings on both properties later that year. Two parcels of land were sold to the city of Lakeland, which allowed for a settlement with the credit union in 2009, but by November 2011, the electricity had been turned off due to unpaid bills, and the property was on the verge of being sold or going into foreclosure.

An audit later made public by a United States Senate committee chaired by Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley showed that Without Walls received $150 million from 2004 to 2006. The Senate report found the church spent tax-exempt ministry funds in one year to pay nearly $900,000 for the couple’s waterfront mansion, over a million dollars in salaries to family members, and paid for the Whites’ private jet. Leaders of the church did not cooperate with the investigation. Although Grassley issued a report outlining his committee’s findings in 2011, no additional action was taken.

On January 1, 2012, Paula White became the senior pastor of New Destiny Christian Center in Apopka, while her ex-husband, Randy White, resumed leadership of the Without Walls Church Tampa location on June 20, 2012, as the Lakeland property had been abandoned the previous year when the electricity was turned off. However, by October 2012, the Tampa property was under foreclosure proceedings by the Evangelical Christian Credit Union after failure to pay loans.

Paula White After Without Walls

On March 4, 2014, Without Walls International Church filed for Chapter 11 federal bankruptcy protection. In response, the Evangelical Christian Credit Union, which said the church owed it $29 million, called the filing a “litigation tactic” to prevent the foreclosure of two church locations. That same year, the United States Bankruptcy Court required the sale of properties. In response to this, Paula White stated that she had no responsibility in the matter as she had been on the Without Walls staff since 2012.

Paula White would serve as senior pastor of the New Destiny Christian Center until May 2019. White became a personal minister to Donald Trump after he watched her television show in 2002 and is credited with having converted Trump to Christianity. She was part of Trump’s Evangelical Advisory Board during his campaign for president, and she provided the invocation prayer during Trump’s inauguration ceremony. White also served as one of the president’s spiritual advisors and held Oval Office prayer circles with him.

On November 4, 2020, White appeared in a Facebook Live stream in which she conducted a prayer service to secure Trump’s reelection, repeatedly calling on “angelic reinforcement” from “angels” from Africa and South America as well as “an abundance of rain.” This was after it became apparent from the election results that Trump was losing to Biden. The video featured White leading the impassioned prayer that included praying in tongues. It quickly went viral across the Internet and received much criticism and ridicule. At the January 6 Capitol attack, she offered the opening prayer before Trump’s speech.

Redevelopment

In February 2015, developers Doug Cook and George Anderson purchased the former Without Walls Central property for about $3.75 million. They made plans to demolish the massive sanctuary to replace it with independent-living units for retirees in place of the church. They also made plans to renovate the former retirement home for union carpenters on the property. Demolition of the megachurch on the property began on March 16, 2015, and construction on the historic Carpenters and Joiners Home commenced soon after. Today, the former retirement home operates as Lake Gibson Village, a senior living community.

Without Walls International eventually moved into a much smaller facility off Grady Avenue in Tampa, still under the leadership of Randy White. By August 2021, White had stepped down and was replaced by Anthony J. Brown. Under Brown’s leadership, Without Walls flourished and launched the Vertical Tampa church in 2022.

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