The book of Proverbs closes with an alphabetical poem in praise of the "worthy woman," in Hebrew eshet chayil, a woman of valor. The word is the one Scripture uses for soldiers and heroes. This is not a quaint domestic portrait; it is wisdom literature's final word, putting flesh on everything the book has taught. Wisdom, Proverbs concludes, looks like a person: someone whose ordinary days are full of skill, initiative, generosity, and reverence.
The verses the wedding lectionary selects make three moves. First, trust: "the heart of her husband trusts in her," and that trust is named as a treasure beyond rubies. Second, works: her hands are busy, and notably they open "to the poor" and "to the needy." Her love for her household overflows outward. Third, the poem's famous conclusion: "Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain; but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised." In a culture saturated with images of surface beauty, Scripture's wedding-day word is that reverence outlasts appearance.
Some couples hesitate because the reading praises only the bride. It helps to hear it the way Israel did: as a portrait of wisdom itself, held up for every believer, and on a wedding day as a public honoring of the bride by the whole assembly. The other readings and the vows speak to both spouses; this one pauses to bless her.
It is also a natural choice when a couple wants to honor mothers and grandmothers, "her children rise up and call her blessed," whose quiet fidelity shaped them.
