One way we  mingle the philosophies of men with scripture is by redefining uncomfortable terms.  We stretch plausibility with our redefinitions but never stop to ask why God or the inspired prophet used that term in the first place.

The temptation is easy to fall in to because we don’t just blindly adopt the world’s concepts when we adopt their words.  The gospel version of a concept is better, purer, and deeper, or it wouldn’t be the gospel concept.  However, it is still recognizably the same thing or it wouldn’t be the concept at all.

Two friends are talking about their third friend Bob.  “I believe Bob is a meaningless collection of physics,” says the atheist.  “I believe Bob is an eternal soul,” says the believer.  But they are both talking about Bob.  It wouldn’t do for the believer to say, “because your definition of Bob is horrible, to me Bob is the bookshelf.”