Ok, you solved the miracle of my issues 
I must admit that I have cleared the cache in the process of migrating from mysql persistence to jdbc persistence. In that context I have changed the appropriate .cfg files in the services directory and the .persist files in the persistence directory. And as I have experienced in the past that the .config files in the cache/org/openhab directory did not update when changing the files in /conf I have cleared the cache.
And this explains now for my case why my container had these troubles as clearing the cache made my OH instance believe that it has its first startup!!! Thank you for clarifying!!!
As other users raised very similar issues at the same time I was lead into the wrong direction.
Thank you for this background information. I will now be careful when clearing the cache … I started doing that as in some topics it is a given solution for some problems … but its obviously not the best
As I will now be careful with clearing the cache I do not expect to run into the same problem again in the future. Setting the userdata/etc/versions.properties manually is a circumvention that I can consider in case it becomes necessary.
So, with that knowledge my request for a flag seems not to be valid anymore. The other users can check for themselves if they are satisfied with your explanation.
Thank you!!!