Most couples choosing a Bible reading pick from a short list: 1 Corinthians 13, Ruth 1:16-17, Song of Solomon 8:6-7, Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 or Colossians 3:12-14. All of them are below, together with the verses about what marriage is and how husbands and wives should treat each other.
The text is the World English Bible, a public-domain translation, so you can print it in an order of service or put it in a wedding video without permission. Your minister may prefer a particular translation for the reading itself.
23 verses and passages · World English Bible (public domain) · each one opens in the maker as a video or a phone wallpaper
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The passages read most often at ceremonies.
Love is patient and is kind; love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Ruth said, “Don’t entreat me to leave you, and to return from following after you, for where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God; where you die, will I die, and there will I be buried: Yahweh do so to me, and more also, if anything but death part you and me.”
Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm; for love is strong as death. Jealousy is as cruel as Sheol. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a very flame of Yahweh. Many waters can’t quench love, neither can floods drown it. If a man would give all the wealth of his house for love, he would be utterly scorned.
Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow; but woe to him who is alone when he falls, and doesn’t have another to lift him up. Again, if two lie together, then they have warmth; but how can one keep warm alone? If a man prevails against one who is alone, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken.
Put on therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, a heart of compassion, kindness, lowliness, humility, and perseverance; 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. Above all these things, walk in love, which is the bond of perfection.
My beloved is mine, and I am his. He browses among the lilies.
No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God remains in us, and his love has been perfected in us.
The verses about two becoming one.
Yahweh God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.”
Therefore a man will leave his father and his mother, and will join with his wife, and they will be one flesh.
What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.
He answered, “Haven’t you read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall join to his wife; and the two shall become one flesh?’ So that they are no more two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, don’t let man tear apart.”
“For this cause a man will leave his father and mother, and will be joined to his wife. The two will become one flesh.”
Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the bed be undefiled: but God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterers.
Whoever finds a wife finds a good thing, and obtains favor of Yahweh.
For anniversaries, vows and the ordinary years in between.
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the assembly, and gave himself up for it…
Nevertheless each of you must also love his own wife even as himself; and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and don’t be bitter against them.
You husbands, in like manner, live with your wives according to knowledge, giving honor to the woman, as to the weaker vessel, as being also joint heirs of the grace of life; that your prayers may not be hindered.
Let the husband render to his wife the affection owed her, and likewise also the wife to her husband.
Who can find a worthy woman? For her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband trusts in her. He shall have no lack of gain.
Let your spring be blessed. Rejoice in the wife of your youth.
Live joyfully with the wife whom you love all the days of your life of vanity, which he has given you under the sun, all your days of vanity: for that is your portion in life, and in your labor in which you labor under the sun.
In love of the brothers be tenderly affectionate one to another; in honor preferring one another…
The shortest ones above, for a caption, a tattoo idea or a phone lock screen. Press Wallpaper to open one at full phone size, ready to download.
What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.
My beloved is mine, and I am his. He browses among the lilies.
Let your spring be blessed. Rejoice in the wife of your youth.
Whoever finds a wife finds a good thing, and obtains favor of Yahweh.
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the assembly, and gave himself up for it…
Make a video opens the Bible verse video maker with the verse and its reference already in place: pick a template, add a hymn or calm music you have the rights to, and export a 9:16 MP4 for Reels, TikTok or Shorts, or 16:9 for a church screen. Wallpaper opens the Bible verse wallpaper maker at the size of a phone screen, with the text kept clear of the clock; export it as a PNG and set it as your lock screen.
Everything happens in your browser, nothing is uploaded, and there is no watermark. Copy puts the verse and its reference on your clipboard for a message or a card.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7 is the most common. Ruth 1:16-17 (“where you go, I will go”), Song of Solomon 8:6-7 (“many waters can’t quench love”) and Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 (“a threefold cord is not quickly broken”) are popular alternatives.
Ecclesiastes 4:12. In the World English Bible: “a threefold cord is not quickly broken.” Couples often read it to describe a marriage with God at its centre.
Mark 10:9: “What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.” Matthew 19:6 says the same in slightly different words.
Every verse is quoted from the World English Bible, a modern English translation its editors have placed in the public domain, as published by Project Gutenberg (ebook #8294). Only the typography is changed: curly quotation marks, psalm titles and musical notes left out, and an ellipsis where a passage stops mid-sentence. American spellings (honor, neighbor) are the translation’s own. You are free to copy, print and share it. More about the choice of translation is on the Bible verses page.