The Ascension Of Jesus Series

Introduction

Edward Lorenz worked as a meteorology professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) from 1948 until his retirement in 1987.

Lorenz was one of the early pioneers figuring out weather patterns using computers. He worked on computer programs that simulated weather patterns.

One day, Lorenz entered some numbers into his computer program and then left his office to get a cup of coffee while the machine ran its calculations.

When he returned to his office, he was shocked by the result of his simulation.

Lorenz’s computer model was based on 12 variables, representing things like temperature and wind speed, whose values could be depicted on graphs as lines rising and falling over time.

On that particular day, Lorenz was repeating a simulation he’d run earlier—but he had rounded off one variable from .506127 to .506.

To his surprise, that tiny alteration drastically transformed the whole pattern his program produced, over two months of simulated weather.

Lorenz was a meticulous researcher. He decided to run the entire simulation again, this time with the complete variable of .506127.

His intuition told him that a variation of less than one part in one thousand could not possibly change the results so drastically.

To his amazement, however, when the computer produced the final result with his complete variable of .506127, it was completely different from the earlier result with the variable of .506.

Lorenz could not believe what he was seeing.

His observation led to a powerful insight into the way nature works, namely, that small changes can have large consequences.

As he later explained, a tiny atmospheric disturbance in Peking, no greater than the flap of a butterfly’s wing, should give rise a week or so later to a Force Twelve hurricane in New York.

Lorenz’s insight that small changes can have large consequences became known as “the Butterfly Effect.”

As a side note, the Butterfly Effect, also known as “sensitive dependence on initial conditions,” has a profound corollary: forecasting future weather conditions can be nearly impossible (https://www.technologyreview.com/2011/02/22/196987/when-the-butterfly-effect-took-flight/).

So, when your favorite meteorologist gets the weather forecast wrong, you can blame it on the butterflies in Peking! Apparently, the weather satellites did not pick up the extra flap in their wings.

Fortunately, life in general is not subject to the chaotic “Butterfly Effect.”

But, once in a while, a small change can have large consequences.

For example, a nail made the difference between victory and defeat in the children’s nursery rhyme, “For Want of a Nail”:

For want of a nail, the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe, the horse was lost.

For want of a horse, the rider was lost.

For want of a rider, the message was lost.

For want of a message, the battle was lost.

For want of a battle, the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a horseshoe nail (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_Want_of_a_Nail)

What is true for a single nail can sometimes be true for a single life. James Allan Francis wrote:

He was born in an obscure village,

The child of a peasant woman.

He grew up in still another village,

Where he worked in a carpenter shop

Until he was thirty.

Then for three years

He was an itinerant preacher.

He never wrote a book.

He never held an office.

He never had a family or owned a house.

He didn’t go to college.

He never visited a big city.

He never traveled two hundred miles

From the place where he was born.

He did none of the things

One usually associates with greatness.

He had no credentials but himself.

He was only thirty-three

When the tide of public opinion turned against him.

His friends ran away.

He was turned over to his enemies

And went through the mockery of a trial.

He was nailed to a cross

Between two thieves.

While he was dying,

His executioners gambled for his clothing,

The only property he had on Earth.

When he was dead,

He was laid in a borrowed grave

Through the pity of a friend.

Twenty centuries have come and gone,

And today he is the central figure

Of the human race,

And the leader of mankind’s progress.

All the armies that ever marched,

All the navies that ever sailed,

All the parliaments that ever sat,

All the kings that ever reigned,

Put together have not affected

The life of man on Earth

As much as that

One Solitary Life (James Allen Francis, The Real Jesus and Other Sermons, Judson Press, 1926, pp. 123-124).

This is the “Butterfly Effect.” It is not operating in meteorology but in history.

The life of Jesus had and continues to have a massive “Butterfly Effect” in the world.

This is what Luke wanted to get across to Theophilus when he wrote his second book, which we call the Book of Acts.