Dionysus on a Bike

Genesis 9:8-17 – 5/11/2026

We usually talk of the problem of evil as a reason to think that God does not exist. The existence of radical evil is thought to preclude the existence of an all-powerful, perfectly good God. What if instead we looked at the problem of evil as a problem for God instead of a problem for us. At the beginning of the Noah story, we saw a regretful creator seek to undo the act of creation by returning the dry land of living things to the chaotic primordial waters out of which God created order, dry land, and the breath of life. God saw how violently cruel humans were to one another, how selfish and self-serving and was sorry to have brought order to the chaos at all. The waters of the flood were not so much punishment as an undoing of creation, the desperate act of a weak and frustrated creator.

Despite deciding to undo creation, God cannot quite allow the act of creation to be completely undone. God does not go through with bringing complete chaos to what God had made. God decides instead to spare Noah and all of the types of living things God had brought out of the primordial chaos. The God who regretted creating at all would also regret undoing the whole thing. What emerges is an indecisive God, a God of two minds who cannot quite figure out what to do with mankind. On the one hand, humans are made in the likeness of God, a reflection of what is good and worthwhile about the one who made them. At the same time, humans are God’s biggest mistake. From the beginning, blessed with everything humans still sought self-serving violence, instead of loving gratitude toward God and one another. The flood narrative and God’s sparing of Noah paint a vivid picture of God going back and forth about how to respond to creatures God loves and yet who reject everything worthwhile about what God had given them.

What strikes me about the end of the flood narrative and the promise to never again attempt to bring about such an undoing of creation is that it represents the end of God being portrayed as exasperated by humans to the point of confusion and indecision. Yes, we still have examples later in Scripture of God changing God’s mind, especially in response to the petition of the faithful, but once God promises not to undo creation after the flood, God never has this ambivalent relationship with creation again. After the flood, even when God is frustrated with humanity, God never regrets their existence or wishes to undo it.

Though it is not in the text, I imagine that God saw the flood and was filled with as much sorrow as had caused God to regret creating in the first place. Humanity might have been desperately wicked, but seeing them drown in the chaos of the primordial waters while only a remnant of life was spared must have filled the creator with deep sorrow and sadness. God’s covenant with Noah and the rest of creation not to destroy by flood again would have been proceeded by a covenant God made with God’s self. “I will never give up on creation again. Creation is worth saving more than it is unworthy of the existence it was given. God decides from that point on to side with creation over everything else in every case. Starting over or undoing what has been done is no longer an option. The only path forward for a creative God is the path of redemption.

Reflections of a Dionysian Lutheran, comments on the daily readings of the Revised Common Lectionary.