Bible Verses About Marriage: 13 for Weddings and Hard Days

Bible verses for a wedding card

Every verse in this guide is quoted from the World English Bible, with a line about where it comes from.

• Song of Solomon 8:7. “Many waters can’t quench love, neither can floods drown it.” From a collection of love poems that tradition credits to Solomon.
• Song of Solomon 6:3. “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.” The woman in the poem says this, and many couples engrave it inside their rings.
• Ecclesiastes 4:9. “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor.” The Preacher, whom tradition identifies as Solomon, on not going through life alone.
• Psalm 127:1. “Unless the LORD builds the house, they who build it labor in vain.” From a song credited to Solomon, and a good one for a couple setting up a home.

Bible verses for a wedding ceremony

• Genesis 2:24. “Therefore a man will leave his father and his mother, and will join with his wife, and they will be one flesh.” The Bible’s first word on marriage, later quoted by Jesus and by Paul.
• Ruth 1:16. “for where you go, I will go; and where you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people, and your God my God.” Ruth said this to her mother-in-law, and couples often borrow it as a vow.
• 1 Corinthians 13:4. “Love is patient and is kind.” Most couples read verses 4 to 7. Our guide to 1 Corinthians 13 goes through them line by line.
• Isaiah 62:5. “As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so your God will rejoice over you.” A promise to Jerusalem after its ruin, picturing God’s joy as a wedding.
• Numbers 6:24–26. “The LORD bless you, and keep you. The LORD make his face to shine on you, and be gracious to you. The LORD lift up his face toward you, and give you peace.” The blessing God gave Aaron to speak over Israel, and a good closing prayer.

Bible verses for a hard season in marriage

Most marriages go through stretches that are tired, tense or sad. These verses are for strain between two people who both want the marriage to work. If you’re afraid of your spouse, go straight to the safety section below.

• Colossians 3:13. “bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, if any man has a complaint against any; even as Christ forgave you, so you also do.” Paul wrote this to a church, and it works at a kitchen table too.
• Proverbs 15:1. “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” From the proverbs credited to Solomon. Your tone often decides where an argument goes.
• James 1:19. “let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger”. Tradition holds that James, the brother of Jesus, wrote this. Most arguments go better in that order.
• Psalm 34:18. “The LORD is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves those who have a crushed spirit.” A psalm of David, for the days you feel alone in your own home.

Much of what helps in a hard stretch is ordinary forgiveness, and our list of Bible verses about forgiveness has more.

What does the Bible say about marriage?

In Genesis 2, the story starts with a problem: “It is not good for the man to be alone.” (Genesis 2:18). Marriage appears there as an answer to loneliness. Later books call it a covenant, a binding promise made before God. Malachi calls a wife “your companion and the wife of your covenant” (Malachi 2:14), and the prophets use marriage to describe God’s faithful love for Israel.

The Bible doesn’t pretend marriage is easy. Its couples lie, quarrel, grieve and fail each other, and God keeps working with them.

How to read Ephesians 5

This is the passage many people find hardest. Paul writes, “Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.” (Ephesians 5:22). If that line stings, you aren’t alone. It has been used to excuse real harm, and you’re right to read it carefully.

Christians read it in different ways. Some hold that it gives husbands a lasting role of loving, self-giving leadership. Others say Paul was working within the household rules of his day, and they put the weight on the line just before it: “subjecting yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ.” (Ephesians 5:21).

Either way, a few things are plain:

• Telling wives to submit would have surprised no one in Paul’s world. The surprise was what he told husbands: “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the assembly and gave himself up for her” (Ephesians 5:25). His pattern for a husband is someone who gives up his life.
• Paul speaks to each spouse about their own conduct. He never tells a husband to make his wife submit.
• The passage gives no one permission to harm. A husband is to treat his wife as his own body: “For no man ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it” (Ephesians 5:29).

A husband who uses this passage to control or frighten his wife has turned it upside down.

If you aren’t safe in your marriage

Some marriages aren’t going through a hard season. They’re dangerous. If your spouse hits you, threatens you, forces you, watches your every move or leaves you afraid to go home, that is abuse, and safety comes first: yours and your children’s.

Nothing in this guide asks you to stay. Verses about forgiving and bearing with one another were never meant to keep anyone in harm’s way. The Bible says, “A prudent man sees danger and hides himself” (Proverbs 22:3), and it says of the LORD, “his soul hates the wicked and him who loves violence.” (Psalm 11:5). You can forgive someone from a safe distance.

Tell someone you trust. If you’re in immediate danger, call 911 or your local emergency number. In the US, the National Domestic Violence Hotline is free and confidential at 1-800-799-7233. If a pastor or friend tells you to go back and try harder, find someone else to talk to.

Common questions