100 Bible Verses about Before Marriage

Hebrews 13:4 ESV / 1,330 helpful votes

Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.

Genesis 2:24 ESV / 808 helpful votes

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

1 Corinthians 6:18 ESV / 705 helpful votes

Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.

1 Corinthians 7:2 ESV / 576 helpful votes

But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

1 Corinthians 6:18-20 ESV / 562 helpful votes

Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

Ephesians 5:3 ESV / 497 helpful votes

But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints.

Colossians 3:5 ESV / 483 helpful votes

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

1 Corinthians 7:1-40 ESV / 476 helpful votes

Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. ...

1 Peter 3:7 ESV / 467 helpful votes

Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

1 Thessalonians 4:3 ESV / 436 helpful votes

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;

Matthew 19:4-6 ESV / 431 helpful votes

He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

Galatians 5:19 ESV / 382 helpful votes

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality,

Genesis 2:18 ESV / 367 helpful votes

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”

1 Corinthians 5:1 ESV / 351 helpful votes

It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, for a man has his father's wife.

1 Corinthians 7:8-9 ESV / 347 helpful votes

To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single, as I am. But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.

Exodus 22:16 ESV / 338 helpful votes

“If a man seduces a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, he shall give the bride-price for her and make her his wife.

Jude 1:7 ESV / 335 helpful votes

Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.

1 Corinthians 10:8 ESV / 325 helpful votes

We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day.

1 Corinthians 7:1-2 ESV / 321 helpful votes

Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

Mark 10:6-9 ESV / 313 helpful votes

But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

1 Thessalonians 4:3-8 ESV / 297 helpful votes

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. ...

Galatians 5:19-21 ESV / 295 helpful votes

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Mark 10:9 ESV / 295 helpful votes

What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

1 Peter 4:8 ESV / 294 helpful votes

Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.

Proverbs 18:22 ESV / 294 helpful votes

He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord.

1 Corinthians 6:16 ESV / 278 helpful votes

Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.”

Proverbs 12:4 ESV / 276 helpful votes

An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, but she who brings shame is like rottenness in his bones.

Proverbs 31:10 ESV / 270 helpful votes

An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels.

1 Thessalonians 4:3-5 ESV / 258 helpful votes

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God;

2 Corinthians 12:21 ESV / 256 helpful votes

I fear that when I come again my God may humble me before you, and I may have to mourn over many of those who sinned earlier and have not repented of the impurity, sexual immorality, and sensuality that they have practiced.

Ecclesiastes 4:12 ESV / 253 helpful votes

And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.

Acts 15:20 ESV / 245 helpful votes

But should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood.

Colossians 3:18-19 ESV / 239 helpful votes

Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them.

Ephesians 4:2-3 ESV / 232 helpful votes

With all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

Genesis 1:27-28 ESV / 232 helpful votes

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

1 Corinthians 6:13 ESV / 230 helpful votes

“Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food”—and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 ESV / 223 helpful votes

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.

Exodus 20:14 ESV / 221 helpful votes

“You shall not commit adultery.

Ephesians 5:33 ESV / 211 helpful votes

However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

1 Corinthians 13:4-5 ESV / 210 helpful votes

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;

Jeremiah 29:11 ESV / 196 helpful votes

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

Ephesians 5:28 ESV / 192 helpful votes

In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.

Genesis 2:22-24 ESV / 189 helpful votes

And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Ephesians 5:1-33 ESV / 182 helpful votes

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. ...

1 Corinthians 6:9 ESV / 182 helpful votes

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality,

Genesis 2:24-25 ESV / 182 helpful votes

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Proverbs 30:18-19 ESV / 179 helpful votes

Three things are too wonderful for me; four I do not understand: the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a serpent on a rock, the way of a ship on the high seas, and the way of a man with a virgin.

Leviticus 20:10 ESV / 179 helpful votes

“If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

1 Timothy 5:8 ESV / 178 helpful votes

But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

Ephesians 5:22-25 ESV / 178 helpful votes

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

Exodus 22:16-17 ESV / 172 helpful votes

“If a man seduces a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, he shall give the bride-price for her and make her his wife. If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money equal to the bride-price for virgins.

Proverbs 19:14 ESV / 164 helpful votes

House and wealth are inherited from fathers, but a prudent wife is from the Lord.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11 ESV / 162 helpful votes

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Matthew 19:9 ESV / 159 helpful votes

And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

Isaiah 54:5 ESV / 156 helpful votes

For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.

Ephesians 5:21 ESV / 155 helpful votes

Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Matthew 19:5 ESV / 155 helpful votes

And said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

1 Corinthians 10:13 ESV / 153 helpful votes

No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

1 Thessalonians 4:3-4 ESV / 152 helpful votes

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor,

Matthew 19:6 ESV / 148 helpful votes

So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

Malachi 2:14-15 ESV / 148 helpful votes

But you say, “Why does he not?” Because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth.

Revelation 1:1 ESV / 147 helpful votes

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John,

Proverbs 5:18-19 ESV / 145 helpful votes

Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice in the wife of your youth, a lovely deer, a graceful doe. Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight; be intoxicated always in her love.

Ephesians 5:25 ESV / 144 helpful votes

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

1 Corinthians 7:1-5 ESV / 143 helpful votes

Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

Matthew 5:32 ESV / 141 helpful votes

But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

Song of Solomon 4:9 ESV / 136 helpful votes

You have captivated my heart, my sister, my bride; you have captivated my heart with one glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace.

1 Chronicles 16:11 ESV / 134 helpful votes

Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually!

1 John 1:9 ESV / 132 helpful votes

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Genesis 39:7-10 ESV / 127 helpful votes

And after a time his master's wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.” But he refused and said to his master's wife, “Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge. He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her.

Ephesians 5:31-32 ESV / 125 helpful votes

“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

Ephesians 5:5 ESV / 125 helpful votes

For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

Matthew 5:28 ESV / 125 helpful votes

But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Revelation 21:8 ESV / 123 helpful votes

But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

Genesis 1:28 ESV / 123 helpful votes

And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

1 Timothy 4:12 ESV / 121 helpful votes

Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.

Genesis 2:18-24 ESV / 121 helpful votes

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. ...

Proverbs 31:1-31 ESV / 116 helpful votes

The words of King Lemuel. An oracle that his mother taught him: What are you doing, my son? What are you doing, son of my womb? What are you doing, son of my vows? Do not give your strength to women, your ways to those who destroy kings. It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine, or for rulers to take strong drink, lest they drink and forget what has been decreed and pervert the rights of all the afflicted. ...

1 John 2:16 ESV / 112 helpful votes

For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world.

Genesis 2:21-24 ESV / 110 helpful votes

So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Ephesians 5:22-33 ESV / 109 helpful votes

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, ...

Proverbs 5:19 ESV / 109 helpful votes

A lovely deer, a graceful doe. Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight; be intoxicated always in her love.

Deuteronomy 24:5 ESV / 108 helpful votes

“When a man is newly married, he shall not go out with the army or be liable for any other public duty. He shall be free at home one year to be happy with his wife whom he has taken.

Galatians 5:19-24 ESV / 105 helpful votes

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. ...

1 Thessalonians 4:7 ESV / 102 helpful votes

For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness.

Colossians 3:19 ESV / 102 helpful votes

Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them.

Malachi 2:16 ESV / 101 helpful votes

“For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”

Matthew 15:19-20 ESV / 98 helpful votes

For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone.”

1 Corinthians 7:3 ESV / 97 helpful votes

The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.

Ephesians 5:32 ESV / 96 helpful votes

This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

1 Corinthians 11:8-9 ESV / 93 helpful votes

For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man.

Song of Solomon 2:7 ESV / 90 helpful votes

I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the gazelles or the does of the field, that you not stir up or awaken love until it pleases.

Matthew 5:27-28 ESV / 88 helpful votes

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

1 Corinthians 7:9 ESV / 87 helpful votes

But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.

Genesis 2:18-25 ESV / 87 helpful votes

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. ...

Mark 9:47-48 ESV / 86 helpful votes

And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’

Deuteronomy 22:5 ESV / 86 helpful votes

“A woman shall not wear a man's garment, nor shall a man put on a woman's cloak, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord your God.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 ESV / 84 helpful votes

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

John 3:16-17 ESV / 79 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Matthew 19:12 ESV / 79 helpful votes

For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.”

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