Flying High by Multiplying MicroGroups

For 24 years, I served as the Head of Security for Fiji Airways while also serving as an assistant pastor in my local church. Throughout those years, I sought to faithfully represent Christ both in the workplace and in ministry. Yet God had much more to teach me about making disciples.

A Life-Changing Encounter with God

On May 1, 2008, I experienced what I describe as my "second encounter" with the Lord. It did not happen at a conference, during a revival meeting, or through a dramatic event. It happened during my daily quiet time.

As I consistently met with God using the SOAP Journaling method—Scripture, Observation, Application, and Prayer—His Word began transforming my heart in profound ways.

My relationship with Christ deepened, and my priorities began to change. I was no longer satisfied with simply serving God.

I wanted to live every area of my life in complete surrender to Him.

The transformation became so significant that, while still working full time at Fiji Airways, God led me to plant a new church in October 2012.

Bringing Discipleship into the Workplace

My workplace became one of my greatest mission fields.

Whenever opportunities arose, I shared the SOAP Journaling method with fellow employees, encouraging them to spend daily, intentional time with God. I continued this throughout the remainder of my career until retiring from Fiji Airways in 2020.

Alongside this, I gathered a group of men for weekly accountability meetings. Together we encouraged one another to remain faithful to Christ despite the pressures of busy work schedules.

I also invested in individual men through one-on-one discipleship, both within Fiji Airways and outside the workplace. While these relationships were meaningful and spiritually encouraging, something was missing.

The Missing Piece

Although I spent countless hours discipling individuals, I noticed very little multiplication.

The men were growing personally, but they were not reproducing themselves by discipling others. That realization was discouraging.

After retiring in June 2020, I continued praying that God would show me a more effective way to fulfill Jesus' command to "make disciples."

Discovering MicroGroups

In June 2023, everything changed.I was introduced to MicroGroup disciplemaking.

Suddenly, my eyes were opened to a biblical pattern of discipleship that I had never fully understood or experienced before. Rather than simply helping believers grow individually, MicroGroups intentionally equip disciples to become disciple-makers themselves.

I immediately started two MicroGroups in my church. Then God placed another burden on my heart. What if I returned to the people I had worked alongside for so many years at Fiji Airways?

Although I had retired, I realized I still had relationships with current employees. Introducing them to MicroGroups became my way of giving back spiritually to the organization where I had spent nearly a quarter of a century.

Returning to Fiji Airways

In October 2023, I approached two former colleagues:

• Mr. Mosese Nasoga, Senior Manager of Safety and Emergency Response
• Mr. Epi Bai, Manager of Quality Assurance

I invited both men to join me in a MicroGroup.

They accepted. Each week after work, we met in coffee shops near the international airport where they were based. Together we studied Scripture, shared honestly, encouraged one another, and learned how to intentionally make disciples who make disciples.

The results exceeded anything I had previously experienced.

Within just a few months, both men launched their own MicroGroups. Today, Epi is leading four MicroGroups. Even more exciting, one of the men in one of his groups has already started another MicroGroup, continuing the cycle of multiplication.

What once seemed impossible through years of one-on-one discipleship began happening naturally through a simple, reproducible model.

The Joy of Spiritual Multiplication

Today I lead three MicroGroups made up of current Fiji Airways employees, and new opportunities continue to open for additional groups.

Looking back, I am deeply grateful for every season of the journey. SOAP Journaling taught me to hear God's voice and apply His Word personally. Those daily encounters transformed my own life.

MicroGroups taught me how discipleship can multiply from one life to another, then another, and another.

Jesus never intended disciplemaking to stop with us. His vision has always been multiplication.

There is no greater joy than watching people you have invested in begin investing in others, who then do the same. That is how the Kingdom grows.

If God can use a retired airline security executive to help multiply disciples in the workplace, He can use any believer who is willing to invest intentionally in others and trust God with the results.

Group 2

One of the men who had been part of the accountability group I led at work in Fiji Airways was Captain Koro Ravai, a B737 Max 8 Training Captain. He learned of Mosese and Epi joining a MicroGroup and he wanted to be part of their group.

However, because of his flight times, he was unable to join the other two gentlemen but decided to have a separate group with a fellow pilot. It was not possible to have a second pilot joined, so he approached an elder in his church to form a MicroGroup with him.

The three of us, started meeting every week in October 2024 until the present moment, and I remember Capt Koro commented
one morning during one of our sessions,

“I am now living my best life ever."

He is praying and looking at an opportunity to start his own MicroGroup of 3-4 with fellow pilots, while Elder Tawake has already started his own MicroGroup.

Group 3

Capt Koro has been sharing his experiences and joy of being part of the MicroGroup with fellow Fiji Airways pilots and challenging them to consider joining a MicroGroup.

Captain Richard Yuen, who is also Senior Manager Flight Operations, and Captain Tu Vitu Silatolu were two pilots who showed interest to join a MicroGroup. Both of them fly the new Air Bus A350-900 aircraft operating to ports like Dallas-Fort
Worth (DFW), Los Angeles (LAX), San Francisco (SFO) in the US, and Vancouver (YVR) in Canada.

Due to their differing flight schedules, weekly in-person meeting will be a challenge, but thankfully, we are able to connect via Zoom in some sessions to ensure consistency in weekly meetings with Capt Richard Yuen, Capt Tu Vitu Silatolu, and myself.

The open doors for disciplemaking at my former workplace is encouraging, and I can see more starting as the men in the current MicroGroups begin to replicate and multiply.

Ben Dolavale
GDI Fiji