Obituary of Margaret Mae Kramer

MARGARET MAE KRAMER – SEPTEMBER 7, 1928 - APRIL 20, 2024

 

OBITUARY

 

Margaret Mae McIntosh was born September 7, 1928 Floyd and Mamie McIntosh in Coffeyville Kansas. She was predeceased by her parents; an infant brother, Billy Dean McIntosh; and daughter-in-law Sherry Lynn Kramer. She is survived by her three children: David Kramer of Collinsville, Oklahoma, Sherryl Johnson and her husband Larry of Owasso, Oklahoma, and Jane Foote and her husband Randy of Owasso, Oklahoma; seven grandsons; and nineteen great grandchildren.        

 

Margaret graduated from Coffeyville High School in 1946. In the fall of 1948 she enrolled at Central Bible Institute in Springfield, Missouri but had to skip the spring semester of 1949. Her father had lost his job and didn’t have money for her to attend that semester.

 

Merrill Kramer was a handsome young Nebraska man who began attending CBI in the fall of 1947 and was in his second year when Margaret came to CBI. The rest is history as Margaret and Merrill were married on June 5, 1949. Both returned to CBI for the fall semester in 1949. Margaret became pregnant by semester’s end and remained at her parents’ home in Coffeyville during the spring semester of 1950. Merrill returned to Springfield for the spring semester and graduated from CBI in May 1950. Upon graduation he rejoined Margaret in Coffeyville.

 

The coupled settled into life in Coffeyville. They immediately immersed themselves in ministry at Coffeyville Assembly of God where they taught Sunday school, children’s church, Missionettes, and Royal Rangers. In addition to her work in the church, Margaret, aided by her children, assisted in numerous vacation Bible schools during summers at various churches in the Coffeyville area.

 

Still living and working in Coffeyville in the late 1960s, Merrill found it necessary to commute from Coffeyville to a new job in Tulsa. Consequently, they decided to move to Owasso in May 1968 when Margaret was 40 years old and where she would spend the remaining 55 years of her life, 44 of those years without her beloved husband Merrill.

  

The family began attending Owasso Assembly of God immediately upon their arrival in Owasso. She served as the youth group leader for a short time but found her true calling as a Sunday school teacher and children’s department superintendent at Owasso First Assembly. Her three children met and married their spouses at Owasso First Assembly.  

 

Margaret excelled at both teaching and leading the children’s department. Margaret oversaw up to a dozen lay workers in Sunday school, children’s church, craft sessions, puppet ministries, children’s Christmas programs, Easter productions, and so forth for about 25 years between 1969 and 1994. She ministered under Pastor Tomlinson for 12 years, Pastor Dorsey for 5 years, Pastor Lambert for 7 ½ years.

 

Margaret’s entire life was devoted to children, both in her home and at church. Even before Merrill’s death in 1980, she provided childcare in her home. After Merrill’s death she worked ten years teaching and mentoring children in a local childcare facility. Thereafter, she provided childcare for up to five children at one time in her home for many years.

 

Amidst all of this were her seven grandsons. It seemed that at least one of the boys was present whenever one came to Margaret’s home. She would occasionally have all seven at one time stay for a sleepover. Can you imagine that?

 

When children were present, her own grandchildren or those of others, she always included instruction in the ways of the Bible.  She taught them to pray, read Bible stories to them, and talked of how to be a follower of Jesus. Today all seven grandsons are serving the Lord and leading their families in the ways Margaret taught them as children.   

    

Margaret’s influence was not limited to just the children she taught and won for the Lord. Several times the families of the children she cared for became Christians and ultimately some attended church at Owasso Assembly. She continued to minister to and impact the lives of many when she could no longer care for children. She was not shy about talking about the Lord to those that crossed her path.

 

When she finally had to have full-time care and went into Evergreen Care Center in January 2019, she continued witnessing, praying, and sharing her love for Jesus to all who came her way—family, residents, and staff alike.

 

 

Margaret Kramer

By Sarah J. McCoy

July 2020, Amended January 2021 and April 2024

 

Margaret Kramer moved to Owasso in the late 1960s with her husband, Merrill, and her children, David, Sherryl, and Janie.  They all quickly became beloved members of First Assembly of God, and Margaret was appointed as the children’s Sunday School Superintendent.  She so loved the kids she supervised, disciplined them kindly when necessary, and took her job very seriously, doing it as unto the Lord.  My mother started nursing school shortly afterward, and my brother, sister, and I would go to Margaret’s house for babysitting, occasionally.  Margaret was always loving, diligent, cheerful, and Christ like. 

 

In those years, our church had a tradition of inviting people to the altar to pray and seek God’s blessing after preaching on Sunday nights.  Children were encouraged to ask God to baptize them in the Holy Spirit, and many people could be heard praying in tongues and worshipping emotionally for long periods.  I grew up in that atmosphere saturated with God’s Presence, and Margaret seemed always to be an important part of it.  On many occasions she would kneel beside me, her hand softly on my shoulder, praying, “Oh dear God, bless Sarah.  Refill her with your Spirit, Lord.  Use her, Lord.”  I loved having her beside me.  She encouraged me, and I wanted to seek God more, because that’s what she did.  Those memories are treasures to me.

 

When I was a little older, Margaret’s dear husband, Merrill was diagnosed with bone cancer.  I watched and participated as the whole church fervently prayed for his healing, but it was not to be.  Margaret’s heart was broken when Merrill died, but she trusted God and continued forward.

 

Margaret then expanded her children’s ministry to include working at a daycare.  For years, she planted seeds of love and prayer in the hearts of the youngest and most impressionable there.  Margaret knew that she was called to her work, and she felt passionate about it.  She also poured herself into her seven grandsons and then into her great-grandchildren as they were born.

 

I loved visiting Margaret at home.  She would tell stories about things from her youth, like being invited by a neighbor lady to church as a child, then finding Christ.  She spoke of her time at Central Bible College in Springfield, Missouri, her courtship with Merrill, and her early marriage.  She talked about being marvelously healed of arthritis when very young.  All the while, her home felt very peaceful.  As I looked around the living room, evidence of love was everywhere—family pictures and gifts from them hung on the walls.  Bibles and devotion books were close at hand.  One of her bedrooms was still outfitted as a playroom for young children.  I would find myself feeling immediately relaxed upon sitting down.  It was as though the very Presence of the Lord hung in the air.

 

In her elderly years, Margaret was a member of my adult Sunday School class.  After she was too weak to live alone and she moved to Evergreen Care Center, Larry and Sherryl would often pick her up for Sunday church quite early in the morning, and she would sit at the back of my classroom as I set things up.  She would always say encouraging, uplifting things and she would mention how glad she was to be there.  It was a great blessing to see her already waiting, even though I arrived more than thirty minutes early.

 

Whenever I visited, we would pray together before I left.  She always insisted on praying last for me, and it brought tears to my eyes.  Once again a fervent prayer in a raised voice went up to God, just like all those years ago at the altar in our church building on Main Street.  “Oh God,” she would cry out, “bless her and keep her family.”

 

When it became necessary to do outdoor visits at Evergreen during the 2020 Covid year, Margaret’s mind had clouded, and she was unclear and confused on many things.  However, she once prayed as our time drew to a close, beautifully, clearly, for several minutes, and it was all praise and thanksgiving.  I thought she was in a time of great need in her life, yet it didn’t occur to her to ask for a thing.  She just felt God’s glory and lifted Him up. 

 

In later years when Covid had passed and we could be close in her room again, she prayed for her visitors, apparently operating in the gift of prophecy at times.  The staff liked her and wanted to be around her, and I was so impressed with how they took great pains to braid her hair or get her things she needed.  Margaret’s face would light up beautifully when she saw people from church that she knew.  Even as some things became unclear, her love for God and for others stayed in sharp focus.  She did not complain, although she often suffered and was in pain.  She just embraced each day and rejoiced to be a child of God.

 

Dear Margaret, you have been such a light, such an example, such an inspiration, and such a sower of good seeds.  Your family and friends will continue to reap your righteous harvest in the generations to come.

 

Thank you, Margaret, for your service to God.  I love you.

 

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