This is a controversial topic, and a lot is going to depend on what it is you're doing with the vehicle.
If it's a daily driver that's going to see a low of highway use, I'd say put it back on, if it's primarily an off road vehicle, you can probably leave it off and never notice that it's missing.
What the sway bar does is reduce the amount of body roll (or sway) and many of us don't really notice what it does - but if you are going through a turn at 50~60+ mph the body leans noticeably, and if for any reason you have to make a sudden change in direction - for the sake of discussion - something falls off of the car in front, a kid darts out into the street - when you swerve and the body rocks you can lose control.
You can test this yourself - find a large clear space and starting at low speed, rock the vehicle in a right-left-right motion, as if you were swerving to miss something and gradually bring the speed up - but not to the point where you actually lose control.
In my case - I had temporarily removed the front sway bar from a Chrysler wagon, couldn't see any significant difference in how it handled and was taking a short out of town trip (no more than 50 miles round trip) and whilst overtaking a truck, hit a pool of water with the driver's side front wheel - that car, normally very stable under those conditions, swerved and swayed, and I had to fight to retain control.
Personally - I would keep the sway bar - you should be able to find longer end links, just take the old ones off and take them down to your closest parts place and tell them you need something an inch or two longer.
