Tribute by Mark
Dear friends, relatives and church members who are especially dear to Kathryn, I welcome you tonight.
We are here to celebrate the life and times of your friend and my dearest friend and partner-in-life, Kathryn Teoh Boon Kee.
I know that you share in our joys and our griefs.
Kathryn had been suffering from breast cancer since 2001. For most parts of the time she had been well until the middle of last year when she had complications in other areas. She had been in hospital for the last two weeks for an operation to remove fluid from her the lining of her lungs. When she went home to be with the Lord yesterday at 9.00 am, she was peaceful with all of her loved ones by her bedside. All throughout she didn't suffer any pain.
The last two weeks have been an occasion for many of you to have been personally and actively involved in taking care of Kathryn and standing with our family in this moment. You have freely offered your time, resources and support, some of you taking leave and many of you laid aside the immediate needs of your family to offer your help to us. For this we are consider ourselves truly blessed to have you.
From all of the friends and relatives that came yesterday and today, I see that Kathryn has touched so many of your lives.
It is not what we have accumulated that speaks of our greatest achievements but what we leave behind when we are no longer around. I can see that Kathryn has left so much of an impact in many of your lives that the memories will continue to linger on even long after we leave here.
I would like to share a glimpse of what Kathryn has been to me. First is a song that I sang at our wedding 25 years ago. This is the song entitled,
“THIS IS THE DAY THAT THE LORD HAS MADE” by Scott Wesley Brown....
Kathryn had all the qualities you could ever ask for in a spouse. She has been my constant companion, my faithful counselor and my endearing friend. If you were to ask me would I marry her again if I had a second chance, I would reply with a resounding yes without any hesitation. Ours was a marriage made in heaven and I will truly miss her for all that she has meant to me and all of us.
She was my faithful counselor. Often we would journal our thoughts and would compare our journal to see what God was speaking to us.
We have been blessed with 3 wonderful children. In this short period of two weeks, I have seen our children grow up overnight. Melissa has taken on splendidly her place and responsibility as our firstborn. Pam and Darren too have grown.
Kathryn must have been loved by the many people whose lives she's touched over the years. All of you who are here and the flowers that we see are an eloquent testimony of how much she is loved. Just today one of her friends remarked that there are so many of her friends who are here to bid her farewell and there are many more who have gone on before who are waiting on heaven's shore to welcome her into the sweet presence of Jesus.
God has been faithful in granting the desires of her heart in particular prayers that she prayed. Many years ago, she had prayed for a good life partner and her conditions were that he must one who loves the Lord, must be a Hokkien and must come from the village clan of Eng Chun. The Lord must have loved her so much that he granted all the conditions. I guess the Lord must have felt that the only genuine Eng Chun clan must come from Klang. The Lord looked for someone from one Glad Tidings Church in Klang and the rest is history.
The second was the salvation of her family. Through her life, she had brought her sister and her mother to the Lord. Last Saturday, she slipped into unconsciousness for more than two hours and we were not sure whether she would come back. We told David, her brother how much she had been praying for him and her dad for such a long time to come to know the Lord. But now she didn't have the opportunity to tell them personally. We spent some time praying and amazingly, shortly after she woke up suddenly and the first thing she wanted to do was to call for David. She then led her brother in a prayer of commitment to the Lord. After that she called for her dad and did the same. Only after that did she feel that her mission was complete.
To my Dad and Mum-in-law, 52 years ago, God entrusted someone whom you named as Boon Kee into your care. You took care of her and loved her. About 25 years ago you entrusted Boon Kee or Kathryn into my care. I have done my part on loving and caring for her. Now I am releasing back to God's arms the Kathryn that you and I love, comforted by the knowledge that she is now more loved and cared for by our heavenly Father.
I wish to thank and acknowledge the people who are here and those who have come earlier:
Members of Kathryn's family and relatives
Members of my family and relatives
My father-in-law's relatives, friends and business associates
The Overcomers Group, Kathryn’s friends from teenage years
Members of Glad Tidings Klang
Members and friends from :
Glad Tidings Petaling Jaya,
Damansara Utama Methodist Church,
SIB Church Kuala Lumpur,
Grace Assembly Subang Jaya,
Grace Assembly Petaling Jaya,
Grace Assembly, Port Klang,
Full Gospel Assembly, USJ
Community Baptist Church, Kota Damansara,
Acts Church, Subang Jaya
Pastor Philip Sung from Bethel Church Melaka
Kathryn's Assuntarian classmates
My Ex-colleagues from Public Bank
My School mates from High School Klang
Kathryn's ex-colleagues from KPMG Group
Kathryn's friends from CCH Tax Publication
Friends from the USJ 4 Secondary School Parent Teachers Association
Special thanks to William Wong, our dear friend from Australia
Peter and Vivien Lee, Kathryn’s cousins from Singapore
Lay Sim, Kathryn’s cousin who rescheduled a flight from Vietnam to be here
To all of us here, I wish to say that Kathryn has lived and she has lived well. I want to share with you the words that Kathryn would have wanted to tell all of us tonight. The verse taken from Psalm 118:17 – In the Message translation it reads,
“I didn't die. I lived. And now I'm telling the world what God did”.
God Bless all of you.
We are here to celebrate the life and times of your friend and my dearest friend and partner-in-life, Kathryn Teoh Boon Kee.
I know that you share in our joys and our griefs.
Kathryn had been suffering from breast cancer since 2001. For most parts of the time she had been well until the middle of last year when she had complications in other areas. She had been in hospital for the last two weeks for an operation to remove fluid from her the lining of her lungs. When she went home to be with the Lord yesterday at 9.00 am, she was peaceful with all of her loved ones by her bedside. All throughout she didn't suffer any pain.
The last two weeks have been an occasion for many of you to have been personally and actively involved in taking care of Kathryn and standing with our family in this moment. You have freely offered your time, resources and support, some of you taking leave and many of you laid aside the immediate needs of your family to offer your help to us. For this we are consider ourselves truly blessed to have you.
From all of the friends and relatives that came yesterday and today, I see that Kathryn has touched so many of your lives.
It is not what we have accumulated that speaks of our greatest achievements but what we leave behind when we are no longer around. I can see that Kathryn has left so much of an impact in many of your lives that the memories will continue to linger on even long after we leave here.
I would like to share a glimpse of what Kathryn has been to me. First is a song that I sang at our wedding 25 years ago. This is the song entitled,
“THIS IS THE DAY THAT THE LORD HAS MADE” by Scott Wesley Brown....
Kathryn had all the qualities you could ever ask for in a spouse. She has been my constant companion, my faithful counselor and my endearing friend. If you were to ask me would I marry her again if I had a second chance, I would reply with a resounding yes without any hesitation. Ours was a marriage made in heaven and I will truly miss her for all that she has meant to me and all of us.
She was my faithful counselor. Often we would journal our thoughts and would compare our journal to see what God was speaking to us.
We have been blessed with 3 wonderful children. In this short period of two weeks, I have seen our children grow up overnight. Melissa has taken on splendidly her place and responsibility as our firstborn. Pam and Darren too have grown.
Kathryn must have been loved by the many people whose lives she's touched over the years. All of you who are here and the flowers that we see are an eloquent testimony of how much she is loved. Just today one of her friends remarked that there are so many of her friends who are here to bid her farewell and there are many more who have gone on before who are waiting on heaven's shore to welcome her into the sweet presence of Jesus.
God has been faithful in granting the desires of her heart in particular prayers that she prayed. Many years ago, she had prayed for a good life partner and her conditions were that he must one who loves the Lord, must be a Hokkien and must come from the village clan of Eng Chun. The Lord must have loved her so much that he granted all the conditions. I guess the Lord must have felt that the only genuine Eng Chun clan must come from Klang. The Lord looked for someone from one Glad Tidings Church in Klang and the rest is history.
The second was the salvation of her family. Through her life, she had brought her sister and her mother to the Lord. Last Saturday, she slipped into unconsciousness for more than two hours and we were not sure whether she would come back. We told David, her brother how much she had been praying for him and her dad for such a long time to come to know the Lord. But now she didn't have the opportunity to tell them personally. We spent some time praying and amazingly, shortly after she woke up suddenly and the first thing she wanted to do was to call for David. She then led her brother in a prayer of commitment to the Lord. After that she called for her dad and did the same. Only after that did she feel that her mission was complete.
To my Dad and Mum-in-law, 52 years ago, God entrusted someone whom you named as Boon Kee into your care. You took care of her and loved her. About 25 years ago you entrusted Boon Kee or Kathryn into my care. I have done my part on loving and caring for her. Now I am releasing back to God's arms the Kathryn that you and I love, comforted by the knowledge that she is now more loved and cared for by our heavenly Father.
I wish to thank and acknowledge the people who are here and those who have come earlier:
Members of Kathryn's family and relatives
Members of my family and relatives
My father-in-law's relatives, friends and business associates
The Overcomers Group, Kathryn’s friends from teenage years
Members of Glad Tidings Klang
Members and friends from :
Glad Tidings Petaling Jaya,
Damansara Utama Methodist Church,
SIB Church Kuala Lumpur,
Grace Assembly Subang Jaya,
Grace Assembly Petaling Jaya,
Grace Assembly, Port Klang,
Full Gospel Assembly, USJ
Community Baptist Church, Kota Damansara,
Acts Church, Subang Jaya
Pastor Philip Sung from Bethel Church Melaka
Kathryn's Assuntarian classmates
My Ex-colleagues from Public Bank
My School mates from High School Klang
Kathryn's ex-colleagues from KPMG Group
Kathryn's friends from CCH Tax Publication
Friends from the USJ 4 Secondary School Parent Teachers Association
Special thanks to William Wong, our dear friend from Australia
Peter and Vivien Lee, Kathryn’s cousins from Singapore
Lay Sim, Kathryn’s cousin who rescheduled a flight from Vietnam to be here
To all of us here, I wish to say that Kathryn has lived and she has lived well. I want to share with you the words that Kathryn would have wanted to tell all of us tonight. The verse taken from Psalm 118:17 – In the Message translation it reads,
“I didn't die. I lived. And now I'm telling the world what God did”.
God Bless all of you.
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