Until about three years ago, Mike Huckabee was—no pun intended—a big target for his political opponents.

A lifetime of bad eating habits and an aversion to exercise landed Huckabee in his doctor's office with chest pains. At 5-foot-11 and 280 pounds, he was dangerously overweight and had Type 2 Diabetes. Combining these factors with the stress from his job, the doctor predicted that the governor would be dead within 10 years.

The doctor also said that without immediate action, "in the course of those 10 years I would find it increasingly hard to get around," Huckabee explained. "Further, with the diabetes, there was a good chance that circulation problems would force him to amputate some of my toes, and I would gradually lose dexterity in my hands—that is if I didn't drop dead of a heart attack before then. That prognosis really scared me."

But what most bothered Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, was the realization that he wasn't being a good steward of his body. "Not only was my condition going to kill me eventually, but those 10 years were not going to be good ones," he said. "Either way, I was not glorifying the Lord with my body."

That's when Huckabee decided to change his life.

"I was raised in a good Christian home," says Huckabee. "My sister and I had two great parents. Our father was a fireman. Our mother was a clerk at the local gas company. They were both good people who loved us and worked hard their whole lives, but we never had a lot of money and material things."

To help make ends meet, Huckabee worked as a disc jockey beginning at age 14, a job he would hold throughout college. He became a Christian at age 10 during Vacation Bible School, and rededicated his life to Christ at age 16 when, as he puts it, "I just decided that I needed to have my life stand for something more.

"At that point I thought my career would take me into a job in Christian broadcasting. I didn't have the money to go to college, and my wife, Janet, and I married when we were both 18. I had to work, and I also had to go to college in the most economical manner. For that reason, I sat down at the beginning of my freshman year and planned out my college career so I could finish in slightly over two years, which is what I did."

In 1976, Huckabee went to work as the Director of Communications for James Robison, a move that would take him to a revival at Immanuel Baptist in Pine Bluff. The church asked him to stay as an interim pastor—an offer he accepted—and he remained for six years. In 1986, Huckabee moved his growing family to Texarkana, where he spent six years at another interim pastorate at Beech Street Baptist Church.

Huckabee jokingly "blames" Baptist traditions for his weight problems.

"I really believe that the Baptist church invented the potluck," Huckabee says. "I'd always been a chubby kid, but childhood activity kept my weight down. Between marriage and the pastorate, I started really packing on the pounds. It was nobody's fault but my own. I made the choices, no matter how bad those choices were. I love fried foods. I love mashed potatoes and gravy. I love biscuits. I loved going to state fairs and enjoying a fried Twinkie. Unfortunately, those bad choices were killing me."

In 1992, Huckabee got a chance to revive a boyhood interest in politics when he decided to run for the U.S. Senate. He lost to former Arkansas Governor Dale Bumpers.

"That was not a good year for Republicans," Huckabee jokes. "But I got an opportunity to taste of something I have always had in the back of my mind. I like politics, and there's a lot more that ministers and politicians have in common than a closet full of dark suits. We both have an opportunity to serve and to really make a difference in people's lives."