A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. — Proverbs 17:17
When things get difficult, it can be challenging to find people who stay.
I can look back over my life and recall many friendships that existed when times were good. The conversations were easy. The gatherings were enjoyable. Life was moving along and the relationships moved with it. But let some difficulty come — let the circumstances get hard enough that being around someone costs something — and those people were suddenly nowhere to be found.
They are no longer in my life. And that is okay. What I am left with is something far more valuable. A small number of people who are still standing. Friends who did not disappear when the season changed. People who showed up in the hard moments and stayed long after the hard moments passed. Those relationships look different from the ones that faded. They have a depth and a durability that only adversity can produce.
Solomon understood the difference. A friend loveth at all times. Not most times. Not when it is convenient or comfortable or when the other person is easy to be around. At all times. Including the seasons when loving someone costs something real. Including the moments when they are broken or struggling or going through something that makes them hard to be near. That is the measure of genuine friendship, not what it looks like when everything is fine but what it looks like when everything is not.
And then the second half of the verse goes somewhere unexpected. A brother is born for adversity. Not born despite it. Born for it. The language implies design and purpose. Some relationships were specifically made for the valley. The person who shows up in your worst season was not there by coincidence. They were placed in your life for exactly that moment. Shaped by their own history with difficulty to be exactly what you need in yours.
Most of us have felt the difference between those two kinds of relationships. The ones that were present in the good seasons but invisible in the hard ones were never really what they appeared to be. Not necessarily through malice; sometimes people simply are not equipped for adversity. They do not know what to say. They do not know how to sit with someone in pain. And so they drift toward easier circumstances and leave you to navigate the hard ones alone.
But the ones who stayed. The ones who showed up at the door or answered the phone at the wrong hour or simply sat with you without trying to fix anything. Those are the ones Solomon is describing. They loved at all times. They were born for this moment in your life.
Take a moment to think about who those people are for you. The ones still standing. The ones whose presence in your life has been proven not by the good seasons but by the hard ones. Those relationships are among the most significant gifts God places in a life.
And then ask the harder question. Are you that person for someone else? Being born for adversity is not just something we receive from others. It is something we are called to be. There is someone in your life right now who is in a hard season. Someone who needs a friend who loves at all times, and not just when it is easy.
Show up. Stay. Be the person who is still there when the difficulty passes. That is what a brother born for adversity actually looks like. Adversity reveals who is actually there. Be the kind of person who shows up and stays.
Someone Else May Need This Today
If this devotional encouraged you, consider sharing it with someone who may need the same reminder today. Sometimes the simplest way to encourage someone is to put the right words in front of them at the right moment.
You never know how God might use one small act of sharing to meet someone exactly where they are.
Share this devotional with someone who could use the encouragement today.
About Another Well Ministries
Another Well Ministries exists to help people slow down, listen deeply, and encounter God in the ordinary places of life. Through devotionals, reflections, and spiritual resources, we seek to create space for faith to be formed with honesty, grace, and hope.
To learn more about the heart of the ministry or explore additional resources, visit anotherwell.org.
