Therefore, when God speaks of his dealing with his, he said, It shall "not be by their covenant," that is, not by that of the law, they then being not under the law (Eze 16:61). What if a plea be commenced against them, a plea for sin, and they have committed sin; a plea grounded upon the law, and the law takes cognizance of their sin? Yet, I say, the plea wants a good bottom, for that the person thus accused is put under another law; hence, he says, "Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law." If the child was under the law, Satan's charge would be good, because it would have a substantial ground of support; but since the child is dead to the law, (Gal 2:19), and that also dead to him, for both are true as to condemnation, (Rom 7:6), how can it be that Satan should have a sufficient ground for his charge, though he should have a matter of fact, sufficient matter of fact, that is sin? For by his change of relation, he is put out of the reach of that law. There is a woman, a widow, who owed a sum of money, and she is threatened to be sued for the debt; now what doth she but married so, when the action is commenced against her as a widow, the law finds her a married woman; what now can be done? Nothing to her; she is not who she was; she is delivered from that state by her marriage; if anything, be done, it must be done to her husband. But if Satan will sue Christ for my debt, he owed him nothing; and as for what the law can claim of me while I was under it, Christ has delivered me by redemption from that curse, "being made a curse for me" (Gal 3:13).
Now the covenant into which I am brought by grace, by which also I am secured from the law, is not a law of sin and death, as that is from under which I am brought, (Rom 8:2), but a law of grace and life; so that Satan cannot come at me by that law; and by grace, I am by that secured also from the hand, and mouth, and sting of all other; I mean still, as to an eternal concern. Wherefore God saith, "If we break his law, the law of works, he will visit our sin with a rod, and our iniquity with stripes; but his covenant, his new covenant, will he not break," but will still keep close to that, and so secure us from eternal condemnation (Psa 89:30-37).
Christ also is made the mediator of that covenant, and therefore an Advocate by that; for his priestly office and advocateship are included by his mediation; wherefore when Satan pleads by the old, Christ pleads by the new covenant, for the sake of which the old one is removed. "In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayed and waxed old is ready to vanish away" (Heb 8:13). So, then, the ground of plea is with Jesus Christ, and not with our accuser. Now, what doth Christ plead, and what is the ground of his plea? Why, he pleads for exemption and freedom from condemnation, though by the law of works his children have deserved it; and the ground for this his plea, as to law, is the matter of the covenant itself, for thus it runs: "For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more" (Heb 8:12). Now here is a foundation-a foundation in law, for our Advocate to build his plea upon; a foundation in a law not to be moved, or removed, or made to give place, as that is forced to do, upon which Satan grounds his plea against us. Men, when they plead before a judge, to plead matters of law.
Now, suppose there is an old law in the realm, by which men deserve to be condemned to death, and there is a new law in this realm that secured men from that condemnation which belongs to them by the old; and suppose also, that I am completely comprehended by all the provisos of the new law, and not by any title thereof excluded from a share therein; and suppose, again, that I have a brangling adversary that pursues me by the old law, which yet cannot in right touch me because I am interested in the new; my advocate also is one that pleads by the new law, where only there is a ground of plea; shall not now my adversary feel the power of his plea to the delivering of me, and the putting of him to shame? Yes, verily; especially since the plea is good, the judge just; nor can the enemy find any ground for a demur to be put in against my present discharge in open court, and that by proclamation; especially since my Advocate has also, by his blood, fully satisfied the old law, that he might establish the new (Heb 10: 9, 11, 12).
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