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Transcript: Erika Kirk on Husband’s Killer, ‘I Forgive Fim’ Speech at Charlie Kirk’s memorial in Arizona

Read the full transcript of widow of Charlie Kirk, Erika Kirk’s remarks during the Charlie Kirk memorial service at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, September 21, 2025.

Listen to the audio version here:

A Widow’s Testament to Faith and Surrender

ERIKA KIRK: Hello. God bless all of you for coming here from all over the world to honor and celebrate my Charlie. Just a few miles from here, two years ago at AmericaFest 2023, Charlie delivered a speech on stage for our TPUSA faith event. Charlie loves speaking off the cuff, he’s very good at that, without a script, so I personally didn’t know what he was going to say.

And what he chose to speak about that day was his submission to the will of God. He quoted one of his favorite Bible verses, Isaiah chapter 6 verse 8: “Here I am Lord, send me.” After Charlie finished, I met him backstage and I spoke to him and I’ll never forget this. I said, “Charlie baby, please talk to me next time before you say that statement. Because when you say something like that, there is so much power in that verse. When you say, here I am Lord, use me, God will take you up on that,” and he did with Charlie.

11 days ago, God accepted that total surrender from my husband and then called him to his side. More than anything, Charlie wanted to do not his will, but God’s will. And over these past 11 days, through all the pain, never before have I found as much comfort as I now do in the words of our Lord’s prayer: “Thy will be done.”

God’s Love Revealed in Tragedy

God’s love was revealed to me on the very day my husband was murdered. On the afternoon of September 10th, I arrived at a Utah hospital to do the unthinkable, to look directly at my husband’s murdered body. I saw the wound that ended his life. I felt everything you would expect to feel. I felt shock, I felt horror, and a level of heartache that I didn’t even know existed.

But there was something else too. Even in death, I could see the man that I love. I saw the one single gray hair on the side of his head, which I never told him about. Now he knows. Sorry baby, telling you now, but never told him, didn’t want to.

I also saw on his lips the faintest smile. And that told me something important. It revealed to me a great mercy from God in this tragedy. When I saw that, that told me Charlie didn’t suffer. Even the doctor told me, it was something so instant that even if Charlie had been shot in the operating room itself, nothing could have been done. There was no faint, there was no fear, no agony.

One moment, Charlie was doing what he loved, arguing and debating on campus, fighting for the gospel and truth in front of a big crowd. And then he blinked. He blinked and saw his savior in paradise. And all the heavenly mysteries were revealed to him.

Words of Comfort and Divine Strength

God’s love continued to be revealed to me in the days that followed. The next day on the tarmac in Air Force Two, I confronted Usha Vance, a precious woman. I held her hand and I told her, honestly, “I do not know how I’m going to get through this.”

She told me something. She said, “You know when you’re on an airplane with your kids and it’s the last 15 minutes of the flight and things are crazy. Kids are not cooperating. Tours are flying everywhere and everyone’s screaming. And you think to yourself, I cannot wait for this flight to land. And it’s 15 minutes before you land.” And she told me, “You will get through these 15 minutes and the next 15 minutes after that.”

Usha, I don’t think you realized it then, but those words were exactly what I needed to hear.

Revival, Not Revolution

But most of all, God’s mercy and God’s love have been revealed to me these past 10 days. After Charlie’s assassination, we didn’t see violence. We didn’t see rioting. We didn’t see revolution. Instead, we saw what my husband always prayed he would see in this country. We saw revival.

This past week, we saw people open a Bible for the first time in a decade. We saw people pray for the first time since they were children. We saw people go to a church service for the first time in their entire lives.

Charlie liked to journal. And I say this because he did it to remember important moments and sayings that affected him. And one of the things he wrote in his journal was this: “Every time you make a decision, it puts a mark on your soul.”

To those of you out there who just made that decision and took the first step toward a spiritual life, I say thank you and welcome. Thank you. One day, I hope you look back and realize it was the most important decision of your life, because it is.

All of you, all of you who are already believers, it is your job to shepherd these people. Do not take that lightly. Water the seed of their faith. Protect it and help it grow. Every day as Charlie rode into the office, he would go through his contact list. And I know there’s many of you who were impacted by this. He would go through his contact list and send Bible verses for the day. He knew that faith was a habit. And the more you live it, the more it grows.

But know this too. The seed has only just been planted. The enemy will tempt you the most in a time like this one. God will always be there for you, but you must choose to mark your soul again and again in the direction of Christ.