Family and friends celebrate Craig Strickland’s life at memorial service

Family and friends celebrated the life of late country singer Craig Strickland at his memorial service on Tuesday (12Jan16).
The bodies of the 29-year-old Backroad Anthem singer and his friend Chase Morland were found by members of a police search party in Oklahoma days after setting off on a hunting trip during winter storm Goliath in late December (15), and on Tuesday, the star was remembered during a service at the Cross Church Pinnacle Hills Campus in Rogers, Arkansas, where hundreds of mourners paid tribute to the young star.
The ceremony, which was also broadcast live on the church’s website, was led by a church official, who told the crowd, “This is a celebration of his life. It’s not going to be all tears. We’re going to have a lot of laughter… He will not be forgotten.”
Strickland also featured in a video montage, which included photos of the singer through the years, and several speakers took the podium to share their moving recollections of the late Strickland.
His wife Helen, who was among the mourners, took to Instagram.com hours before the memorial and posted a photo of the handwritten letter she put in her husband’s jacket pocket prior to his burial.
The note read: “I love you with all my heart. I will miss doing life with you on this earth. You were my person and are the love of my earthly life. Thank you for sharing the last few years you had with me. I know you are in better hands than mine. The Lord is taking care of you, and loves you more than I could ever imagine. I can’t wait to see you again in heaven. I love you… I can’t say that enough. I will see you soon.”
She then added the caption, “Today I buried my husband… Craig established relationships with each of us so that he could see us again. So let us love one another like Craig did. Let us pray for strangers. And let us establish relationships with one another with the goal of establishing Christ-like relationships so that we can see each other again in heaven.”