Trading for Joy

This is not meant to be a rhetorical question ...

Many years ago, now, a man in our church faced cancer and did not survive. He was a worship leader, he remained positive and praised God to the end. The first time I heard this song at his funeral - from all reports it was a song he really *lived out* until the end:

I'm trading my sorrow I'm trading my shame I'm laying it down for the joy of the Lord

I'm trading my sickness
I'm trading my pain
I'm laying it down for the joy of the Lord

Chorus:
And we say yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord
Yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord
Yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord Amen

I'm pressed but not crushed persecuted not abandoned
Struck down but not destroyed
I'm blessed beyond the curse for his promise will endure
And his joy's gonna be my strength

The joy of the Lord is the strength of my life
The joy of the Lord is the strength of my life
The joy of the Lord is the strength of my life, Amen

Though the sorrow may last for the night
His joy comes with the morning

Somehow my brain can wrap around how - theoretically, at least - one might be able to live this out in a big trial. Persecution for your faith, cancer, something where it's hard to escape the Sovereign hand of God in action. Somehow it seems easier to see the potential to live well and die well in the joy of the Lord in big things.

But I know God is also Sovereign in the little things. The days of fatigue. An afternoon with a crushing headache.

What I'm wondering is ... how do I really live out this idea in the little daily things? How do I trade a really bad headache for the joy of the Lord? Or a stuffy head and sore throat? Or those days when you're just so pooped but there's no nap on the horizon?

Help me "put some feet on this" ... how do you trade little sorrows and shame and sickness and pain for the joy of the Lord? How do I make the joy of the Lord the strength of my life in all the little ups and downs of the day?

Oh, that my life would be clearly built on the joy of the Lord.