Here's what the settings for this formatter look like in Backdrop:

...and here are the available options for the "Display" setting:

...and here's the summary of the settings:

This seems very limiting, since: - The option is called "time ago", but it also allows setting it to a "time hence" - it would be better called something like "time difference" instead - You can only set the formatter to "time ago" or "time hence", which works fine if you know for sure that the field will be used to enter dates either in the past or in the future, but not both. So if you set a date in the future, the time diff will be shown as "time hence" ...but once that date comes and passes and is in the past, it will not work.
In D8+, you are allowed to set a format for both ago/hence:
...and the summary indicates that things will work for both future/past dates:

Recent comments
You can use this module: https://backdropcms.org/project/search_api_block
Search Api form in header?
Have you looked at the BG Image Formatter https://github.com/backdrop-contrib/bg_image_formatter
How to access node fields in block template files
You could also try Current Content Display Block which with a bit of config and CSS could get you what you need.
How to access node fields in block template files