What does the Bible say about the importance of the wedding ceremony?

Question:

Please, if it is possible, write an article with biblical references, on how the wedding ceremony should take place. As much as I have read from the Bible, I have not found anywhere that the wedding ceremony was officiated as it is officiated in the Orthodox church, Baptist church and others. I know that Jesus attended a wedding, but it is written there only about the time when they were eating, and not about any priest or pastor who would have performed the wedding ceremony. Thanks in advance! Be blessed by the Lord!

Religious ceremony is the most important part of a wedding

The wedding ceremony is the most important element of the wedding and it has been always officiated when people got married. In the modern world many have separated wedding from the religious ceremony and this is a great evil. Marriage is a covenant and wedding ceremony is the official ceremony of concluding this covenant. In the book of the prophet Malachi, when He rebuked the men of Israel for their lack of faithfulness in marriage, God said:

This is another thing you do: you cover the altar of the LORD with tears, with weeping and with groaning, because He no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. Yet you say, ‘For what reason?’ Because the LORD has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. (Malachi 2:13-14)(NASB)

Conclusion of this covenant was performed on the wedding day and it was what we call wedding ceremony. Covenant marriage is concluded before God and before witnesses who are wedding guests. In the book of Proverbs of Solomon, when he warns about immorality, the author writes about immoral woman, as it follows:

… to deliver you from the strange woman, from the adulteress who flatters with her words; that leaves the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God. (Proverbs 2:16-17)(NASB)

Where does the expression “wedding ceremony” come from?

In the Orthodox Church, when the ceremony is officiated, witnesses hold a beautiful crown over the heads of the bride and groom. From these crowns, the official ceremony of the covenant marriage was called “crowning”. It seems that the Jews had something similar in the Old Testament, because prophet Isaiah wrote:

I will rejoice greatly in the LORD, my soul will exult in my God; for He has clothed me with garments of salvation,
He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. (Isaiah 61:10)(NASB)

Regardless of how the ceremony will be officiated (with crowns, as the Orthodox church does, or without them, as the Baptist Church does), it is very important that young people understand well that they enter into the holy covenant of marriage and that God is witness to this covenant. So, the pastor or the priest will make and should make every effort to explain the seriousness of the marriage covenant, because husband and wife should reflect through their marriage the relationship between Christ and His Church. God help all married people to reflect well this divine model.

Translated by Felicia Rotaru