And I will persecute them with the sword, and with famine, and with the pestilence: and I will give them up unto affliction to all the kingdoms of the earth: to be a curse, and an astonishment, and a hissing, and a reproach to all the nations to which I have driven them out:
Jeremiah 29:16 For thus saith the Lord to the king that sitteth upon the throne of David, and to all the people that dwell in this city, to your brethren that are not gone forth with you into captivity.
Jeremiah 29:17 Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Behold I will send upon them the sword, and the famine, and the pestilence: and I will make them like bad figs that cannot be eaten, because they are very bad.
Jeremiah 29:18 And I will persecute them with the sword, and with famine, and with the pestilence: and I will give them up unto affliction to all the kingdoms of the earth: to be a curse, and an astonishment, and a hissing, and a reproach to all the nations to which I have driven them out:
Jeremiah 29:19 Because they have not hearkened to my words, saith the Lord: which I sent to them by my servants the prophets, rising by night, and sending: and you have not heard, saith the Lord.
Jeremiah 29:20 Hear ye therefore the word of the Lord, all ye of the captivity, whom I have sent out from Jerusalem to Babylon.
The verse centers on "persecute", "sword", "famine", "pestilence", "give", "affliction", "kingdoms", and "earth". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "persecute" and "sword", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.
The nearby context moves from verse 17's "Thus saith the Lord of hosts Behold..." into verse 19's "Because they have not hearkened to my...", so "persecute" and "sword" belong inside that flow. In Jeremiah context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.
A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "persecute" and "sword" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.