Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a pulmonary disease that requires the use of mechanical ventilation for patient recovery. However, this can lead to development of ventilator-induced lung injury (VILI) caused by the over-distension of alveolar tissue, and by the repetitive closure (de-recruitment) and reopening (recruitment) of airways. In this study, we developed a multi-scale model of the lung from a reduced dimension approach to investigate the dynamics of ventilation in the lung during airway collapse. The reduced dimension approach implies that our modeling scheme simplifies the morphometric and micro-scale mechanics within the lung in an empirical formulation that still encompasses the critical mechanical interactions of all the components. In particular, we are interested in the mechanical interactions of surface tension, lung parenchyma, and liquid plug obstructions in the airways. This model provided insights in the complex interactions and effects that these components have on lung behavior. Additionally, this model provides a scalable and modular foundational system in which future mechanical and biological mechanisms can be added. It is the hope that this will eventually serve as a predictive computational tool to investigate treatment strategies, particularly in mechanical ventilation, for various pulmonary conditions.