diff --git a/cmake/kconfig.cmake b/cmake/kconfig.cmake
index 71668d0fe8a..1aac82f0dea 100644
--- a/cmake/kconfig.cmake
+++ b/cmake/kconfig.cmake
@@ -204,8 +204,9 @@ foreach(f ${merge_config_files})
 
   list(APPEND merge_config_files_with_absolute_paths ${path})
 endforeach()
+set(merge_config_files ${merge_config_files_with_absolute_paths})
 
-foreach(f ${merge_config_files_with_absolute_paths})
+foreach(f ${merge_config_files})
   if(NOT EXISTS ${f} OR IS_DIRECTORY ${f})
     message(FATAL_ERROR "File not found: ${f}")
   endif()
@@ -214,7 +215,7 @@ endforeach()
 # Calculate a checksum of merge_config_files to determine if we need
 # to re-generate .config
 set(merge_config_files_checksum "")
-foreach(f ${merge_config_files_with_absolute_paths})
+foreach(f ${merge_config_files})
   file(MD5 ${f} checksum)
   set(merge_config_files_checksum "${merge_config_files_checksum}${checksum}")
 endforeach()