No need for alarm, Part 2: Wedding edition

"In the Christian church, we use many symbols," my dad told those assembled at the wedding yesterday. "One symbol is the siren."

With that, there came an eruption of laughter to rival the grating drone of the alarm siren that had already disrupted several minutes of the wedding. Deviating from the explanation of the wedding candle, my dad offered the bride, the groom, and everyone else a chance to find the humor in a wedding scenario that was hardly of the storybook variety. My dad, even in an unfamiliar church in another state and before a crowd of mostly unfamiliar people, was in top form.

The bride was my cousin, Erin. She had asked my dad, a pastor in my hometown of Green Bay, Wis., to perform the ceremony in a church west of Minneapolis, where my mom grew up and where most of her side of the family still resides. Erin was marrying a guy named Aaron. That should have been humor enough. But with only a few words to go in my dad's short sermon, the siren inexplicably sounded throughout the church.

"Could someone turn off their cell phone?" my dad joked after finishing his message to the bride and groom. A couple people darted into the hallway to see what they could do, which turned out to be nothing much. The ceremony proceeded with the exchange of the vows and rings and then the kiss, all to the delightful soundtrack of the alarm. Finally, as the soloist was performing (in a key so accommodating that the siren could have been the pleasant bass tone of bagpipes), the alarm stopped. During all that time, my dad maintained focus and added some humor to keep the people from thinking that the big day was ruined. And Erin and Aaron were great sports and rolled with it.

I've come to realize that no wedding is complete without some little harmless disaster. As my dad says, something like that makes a wedding memorable. Indeed, of the six weddings I have attended in 2006, this was the highlight. I'd put it right up there with my own wedding last year.

When Tracy and I got married, my dad, in lieu of performing the ceremony (he didn't want to, and, lucky for him, he wasn't able to due to the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod rules at my wife's home church), agreed to perform the special music. He sang John Ylvisaker's "I Was There to Hear Your Borning Cry," which he had sung countless times at confirmation and high school graduation services. But apparently a bit emotional about his kid getting married, he forgot the words halfway into the first verse. After he stumbled a bit, the words suddenly popped into my head, and I fed him the missing lyrics while standing at the altar. He finished the song with no further problem and thanked me for the help. This became an unforgettable highlight of the ceremony.

As we were exiting the sanctuary from Erin and Aaron's wedding yesterday, the cops were exiting the basement. Apparently someone had pulled a fire alarm station elsewhere in the church while fumbling for a light switch. It was another false alarm (see the previous entry, "No need for alarm" from a month ago). The good news was that there wasn't a fire. That would have been a wedding-day disaster that would be a bit harder to brush off. I don't know how my dad would have handled that one.

I do know that I'm really proud of my dad. He does a great job, not only preaching and helping people in times of need but also putting people at ease even in circumstances like this. He's so good at what he does that it was a bit daunting for me to consider becoming a pastor. But now I'm on my way, and I know that if I'm able to do half the job my dad has done and helped half as many people, I'll have done alright. I was proud enough yesterday to be part of the wedding ceremony with him — I got to do the readings (before the siren). I can only imagine what sort of challenges await me at the weddings I'll officiate in the future (my dad said the first 200 weddings are the toughest). But I think I'll manage — as long as I don't have to sing at my kid's wedding.