Excerpt from “The Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball”, Pg. 212,213: ¹

The poor have special need to tithe. There are people who say they cannot afford to pay tithing, because their incomes are small. They are the people who need the blessings of the Lord! No one is ever too poor to pay tithing, and the Lord has promised that he will open the windows of heaven when we are obedient to his law. He can give us better salaries, he can give us more judgment in the spending of our money. He can give us better health, he can give us greater understanding so that we can get better positions. He can help us so that we can do the things we want to do. However, if we like luxuries or even necessities more than we like obedience, we will miss the blessings which he would like to give us.

One woman went to her bishop and wanted to pay a little tithing that she owed. The bishop said, “No, you keep it. You can’t afford to pay tithing. You need every cent that you make.” But this woman said, “Bishop, you have no right to deprive me of the blessing that I will receive if I pay tithing.” Encourage children to tithe. Now, I know that you do not have very big incomes, but remember it does not matter how little you make, you pay your tithing. Give the children a chance to learn tithing. If one of the little boys or girls earns only fifty cents in a whole year, he goes to the branch president and pays one nickel for tithing and that is just as good as the man who pays $10,000. The Lord is not looking at the amount; all he is looking at is the percentage.

Let children see parents pay tithing. So, wouldn’t it be wonderful if every father in Zion would take his children with him to pay his tithing and let them see him give the bishop the amount of money that represents sacrifice to him, so that the children also would feel the need of it.

The tithing principle is a solution for poverty. The cure to poverty lies in Isaiah fifty-eighth chapter and in Malachi third chapter: “Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house. ” I hear voices asking in insolence and wonder and disbelief: “How can a scripture solve poverty and want?” Then I quote further: “And prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.” (Malachi 3:10.) Ah! That is what we need across the tracks, in India and Pakistan, in our big cities, in disadvantaged countries — to have the heavens open. Apparently earth has not provided the answer; now shall we try heaven? The Lord has promised to open the windows of heaven. To hear the population explosion experts talk and write — those people who think themselves so wise — they would depopulate the earth so that the few left would roll in luxury rather than that all the Lord’s children could come to earth and have a body and mortality and the good things of the earth….